tibvwy  of  trhe  trheolocjical  £min<xry 

PRINCETON  •  NEW  JERSEY 


FROM  THE  LIBRARY  OF  THE 
REVEREND  JESSE  HALSEY,  D.D. 

BV  4832  .G67  1918 

Goss,  Charles  Frederic,  185: 

-1930. 
Just  a  minute! 


Just  A  Mi 


/; 


MOMENT- READINGS  ON  SCRIPTURE  PASSAGES, 
AND  A  FEW  ON  THE  GREAT  WAR 


BY 

CHARLES  FREDERIC  GOSS,  D.D. 

Author  of  "The  Redemption  of  David  Corson," 
"The  Optimist"  Etc. 


CINCINNATI 

STEWART  &  KIDD  COMPANY 

1918 


Copyright,  1904,  by 
The  Sunday  School  Times  Co. 

Copyright,  1918,  by 
Stewart  &  Kidd  Company 

All  Rights  Reserved 


Dedication  to 
REVEREND  ARTHUR  S.  HOYT,  D.D. 

Professor  of  Sacred   rhetoric  in  Auburn  Theo- 
logical Seminary,   my  boyhood  playmate, 
college  chum,  and  life-long  friend, 
this  book  is  lovingly  dedicated 


Introduction 


NO  other  phrase  in  the  daily  speech  of  us 
American  men  and  women  falls  so  fre- 
quently from  our  lips  as  "Just  a  minute." 

The  telephone  girls  repeat  it  a  thousand 
times  each  day.  Mothers  utter  it  in  response 
to  the  querulous  or  insistent  claims  of  their 
children;  clerks  to  impatient  customers;  nurses 
and  doctors  to  sick  people  whimpering  for 
attention;  all  people  to  all  other  people  in  all 
the  frenzied  rush  of  modern  life.  "Just  a 
minute,  just  a  minute,  just  a  minute."  How 
different  it  is  from  the  Un  poco  tiempo  of  the 
Spaniard,  which,  in  reality,  is  "Never!" 

We  mean  exactly  what  we  say,  and  are 
straining  every  nerve  to  finish  up  this  present 
moment's  task  to  take  the  next  one  up. 

A  single  minute!  What  prodigious  happen- 
ings have  taken  place  in  sixty  seconds!  A 
single  minute  has  decided  the  destinies  of 
men  and  nations.  They  have  signed  a  treaty, 
read  a  paragraph,  a  text,  a  single  sentence, 
and  a  door  has  opened  to  a  larger  life. 

We  do  not  need  to  read  a  book  to  become 
wise  unto  salvation!  A  phrase  will  sometimes 
do. 


Literature  is  created  by  a  double  method. 
In  the  first  place,  by  expansion,  in  which  we 
take  a  truth  which  has  been  stated  in  a  single 
sentence  and  elaborate  it  into  a  volume.  In 
the  second  place,  by  contraction,  in  which  we 
take  a  book  and  compress  it  into  an  epigram. 
The  former  method  suits  our  days  of  leisure, 
the  latter  our  hours  of  fierce  endeavor;  hours 
in  which  who  reads  at  all  must  do  so  on  the 
run. 

The  fragments  in  this  little  volume  have 
been  prepared  for  times  like  those.  They  are 
like  the  tabloid  foods  which  explorers  carry 
with  them  on  their  expeditions  and  soldiers 
on  their  marches.  It  is  a  book  for  callers  to 
pick  up  from  a  parlor  table  while  waiting  for 
a  hostess;  or  visitors  to  glance  at  before  re- 
tiring in  the  guest-chamber  of  a  friend. 

May  it  offer  the  bread  of  life  to  some  hungry 
soul  in  that  swiftly-flitting  moment  which  is 
his  only  opportunity  for  reading  in  one  of 
those  frenzied  days  through  which  all  of  us 
have  to  pass  so  often  in  our  high-pitched 
modern  life,  when 

"  We  see  all  sights  from  pole  to  pole, 
And  nod  and  glance  and  bustle  by, 
But  never  once  possess  our  souls 
Before  we  die." 


VI 


Just  a  Minute! 


&{£te>  David  <was  sitting  between 
the  favo  gates  {2  Sam.  18  :  24). 

\17HAT  was  he  doing?  Waiting,— that 
*  "  was  all.  He  had  done  everything  that 
lay  in  his  power,  —armed  the  last  soldier,  per- 
fected the  last  plan,  given  the  last  command. 
And  now  there  remained  nothing  but  to  sit 
quietly  and  helplesslv  between  the  gates  and 
wait  while  the  great  events  transpired  beyond 
the  reach  of  eye  or  ear  or  hand.  Ah  !  but  that 
is  a  thousand  times  harder  than  action,  or 
even  passion.  What  is  more  terrible  than  just 
waiting?  If  you  have  not  acquired  the  art  of 
patient  waiting,  you  had  better  learn  it  at 
once  ;  for  you  will  have  to  sit  much  of  your 
lifetime  between  the  gates,  waiting  helplessly 
while  the  forces  you  have  set  in  operation 
slowly  work  out  their  inevitable  results.  The 
merchant  must  sit  between  the  gates,  and  wait 
for  the  people  to  whom  he  has  sold  his  goods 
to  earn  the  money  to  pay.  The  author  must 
sit  between  the  gates,  and  wait  for  the  pub- 
lishers to  accept  or  reject  his  manuscript. 
The  sailor's  wife  must  sit  between  the  gates, 
i 


and  wait  for  the  winds  to  blow  her  husband's 
vessel  home.  We  all  reach  a  point  where  we 
can  do  no  more,  and  then — we  must  just  wait. 
Alas  !  ' '  we  usually  learn  to  wait  only  when  we 
have  no  longer  anything  to  wait  for. ' '  Adopt 
the  pace  of  nature  ;  her  secret  is  patience. 
"Upon  the  heat  and  flame  of  thy  distemper 
sprinkle  cool  patience. ' '  Are  you  sitting  be- 
tween the  gates  waiting  ?  Do  it  with  the 
noble  dignity  of  a  David.  If  the  messenger 
is  to  bring  you  sorrow,  receive  it  with  sub- 
mission. 

Wrought  great  wonders  (Acts  6:8), 

F  DO  not  say  that  to  'Move  and  help  men 
and  God ' '  will  enable  you  sooner  or  later 
to  heal  the  sick  and  raise  the  dead.  I  do  not 
say  that  to  "love  and  help  men  and  God" 
will  even  make  you  work  great  signs  and  won- 
ders among  the  people,  like  those  done  by 
Whitefield,  Wesley,  and  Moody.  But  this  I 
will  say,  that,  in  that  little  circle  where  God 
has  placed  you,  the  "grace  and  power"  of  a 
blameless  life  of  love  and  helpfulness  will  work 
wonders  beautiful  enough  for  any  man.  Is  it 
no  "miracle"  to  lift  the  burdens  from  the 
shoulders  of  your  old  father  and  mother  ?  to 
soothe  the  heartaches  of  some  unfortunate 
brother  or  sister?    to  bring  joy  and  hope  to 

2 


the  soul  of  a  sorrowing  neighbor  ?  If  I  had 
my  choice,  to  be  a  wonder-worker  on  a  great 
scale  but  fail  as  a  son  or  brother,  or  to  be  a 
good  son  or  brother  and  fail  as  a  wonder- 
worker, I  wouldn't  hesitate  a  minute. 


Fulfil  thy  ministry  (2  Tim.  4  :  5). 

/COMPLETENESS  in  character  is  only  a 
^^  little  more  beautiful  than  completeness 
of  effort.  In  fact,  it  is  generally  the  result  of 
such  effort.  A  life  filled  full  of  service  !  Can 
anything  be  grander  ?  I  wonder  why  the  man 
who  coined  the  word  ' '  fulfil ' '  couldn'  t  have 
made  it  just  plain,  simple  "filfull"  !  I  love 
to  see  an  honest  dairyman  fill  a  quart  cup  full 
with  milk.  He  makes  it  run  over.  It  is  very  dis- 
gusting to  see  people  overflowing  with  flattery, 
affectation,  or  the  like,  but  what  do  you  think 
of  the  man  who  comes  up  like  a  bucket  out  of 
your  grandfather's  well,  full  to  the  brim,  and 
spilling  over  at  every  turn  of  the  windlass? 
I  know  people  whose  every  day  is  pressed 
down  and  running  over  with  devotion,  good- 
ness, generosity,  love.  Fill  your  life  up  to 
the  brim.  It  will  hold  as  much  as  the  bed  of 
the  ocean.  Who  can  measure  the  contents  of 
a  life  like  D.  L.  Moody's,  running  over  at  the 
brim  like  a  perennial  fountain?  Once,  after 
3 


traveling  a  whole  day  without  a  drop  of  water, 
I  came  to  an  abandoned  Texas  farmhouse, 
and  let  a  bucket  down  into  a  well  a  hundred 
feet  deep,  and  heard  it  strike  a  dirt  bottom. 
No  wonder  the  farmer  abandoned  the  ac- 
cursed spot.  And  there  are  lives  like  this. 
Is  it  any  wonder  that  people  abandon  them  ? 


So  Jonathan  made  a  covenant  ivtth  the 
house  of  David  (/  Sam,  20  :  16), 

HOW  large  a  figure  such  promises  cut  in 
human  life.  Civilization  could  not  go 
forward  without  them.  They  enter  into  all 
human  relationships.  The  child  promises  the 
parent  that  it  "will  be  good."  Lovers  prom- 
ise each  other  to  be  faithful  unto  death.  Men 
promise  to  pay  debts  and  to  deliver  goods. 
Governments  promise  each  other  to  maintain 
peace  or  to  unite  in  war.  Without  a  high 
sense  of  their  obligations,  business  would  go 
to  pieces,  and  society  disintegrate.  There  is 
little  to  hope  for  in  the  life  of  a  boy  or  girl 
who  will  not  keep  their  word.  Your  word  of 
honor  ought  to  be  as  sacred  as  a  most  solemn 
oath.  It  must  be  as  good  as  a  witnessed  bond. 
Bad  promises  are  better  broken  than  kept ;  but 
good  ones  must  be  fulfilled  at  the  cost  of  prop- 
erty and  life.  Who  doubts  that  either  one 
4 


of  those  magnificent  young  Jews  would  rather 
have  died  than  broken  that  covenant ! 


(According  as  each  hath  recefbed 
a  gift  (/  Pet  4  :  10). 

'THANK  God  for  that  word  "according"  ! 
*  There  is  one  thing  that  human  nature 
never  does,  which  the  divine  nature  never 
fails  to  do, — and  that  is,  to  preserve  true 
ratios.  God  suits  the  back  to  the  burden,  and 
the  burden  to  the  back.  From  him  to  whom 
much  hath  been  given,  much  shall  be  required; 
from  him  who  hath  little,  little.  God  never 
demands  a  ten-talent  dividend  from  a  one- 
talent  man.  On  that  wisdom  and  justice  I 
pillow  my  head  and  heart.  But  the  exaction 
will  be  ' '  according  to  the  gift ; ' '  and  oh, 
when  we  see  ourselves  as  God  sees  us,  how 
pitiful,  how  contemptible,  shall  we  seem  ! 

For  I  kno%>  my  transgressions;  and  my 
sin  is  ever  before  me  (Psa.  51  :  3). 

1MO  MORTAL  man  can  endure  the  per- 
manent consciousness  of  a  great  sin 
without  either  penitence,  moral  ruin,  or  men- 
tal collapse.  It  is  a  fearful  dilemma.  I  be- 
lieve in  teaching  children  to  look  their  sins  in 
5 


the  face.  Harrow  their  consciences.  Make 
them  realize  their  guilt.  If  you  smooth  over 
their  vices  and  extenuate  their  faults  you  ruin 
them.  There  is  hope  for  Little  Bill  if  he  looks 
pale  in  the  face  and  black  around  the  eyes 
until  he  confesses  the  lie  he  has  told.  If  he 
cannot  shake  off  the  memory  of  it,  if  it  pur- 
sues him  like  a  shadow,  if  it  is  ever  before 
him,  night  and  day,  thank  God  and  take  cour- 
age. He  will  come  out  all  right.  It  is  the 
boys  who  can  kill  birds  and  not  dream  about 
them  nights  that  I  despair  of.  It  was  the  tor- 
ment of  an  irrepressible  vision  of  his  guilt  that 
drove  David  at  last  to  penitence. 


Encourage  the  fainthearted  (/  Thess.  5  :  14), 

I'VE  had  my  share  of  life's  pleasures,  and 
want  to  testify  as  to  which  is  the  sweetest 
of  them  all.  It's  " putting  heart"  into  people 
who  have  lost  it.  The  saddest  sight  that 
Nature  holds  up  to  God  is  a  boy  or  girl  who 
has  'Most  heart."  Poor,  dispirited,  hopeless 
little  folks  !  What  can  any  one  do  without 
" heart"?  Not  to  be  able  to  put  your 
"heart "  into  a  task  is  to  be  certain  of  failure. 
It  is  almost  as  fatal  to  be  only  "half-hearted." 
But  how  terrible  to  lose  heart  entirely  !  And 
yet  in  every  group  of  children  you  are  liable 
6 


to  find  some  timid,  shrinking  creature  who  has 
already  lost  the  "courage  of  life."  How 
beautiful  it  is  to  " hearten  him  up, "  — to  breathe 
hope  into  his  empty  spirit  !  And  how  easy  it 
is — often.  Sometimes  a  single  kind  word  will 
do  it,  sometimes  even  a  smile  of  encourage- 
ment. You  can  do  a  thousand  times  as  much 
for  child  or  man  by  putting  heart  into  his 
bosom  as  you  can  by  putting  either  learning 
into  his  head  or  money  into  his  pockets. 


Hawing  therefore  obtained  the  help 
that  is  from  God  (Acts  26  :  22)* 

TTHE  help  that  is  from  God.  There  are 
many  kinds  of  help, — the  help  of  money, 
the  help  of  friendship,  the  help  of  health,  the 
help  of  knowledge,  the  help  of  experience. 
But  there  is  also  the  help  that  is  from  God. 
It  is  a  very  peculiar  and  wonderful  help  in- 
deed. It  is  a  help  that  people  do  not  believe 
in  until  they  are  in  extremity.  They  want  to 
help  themselves,  or  have  some  human  being 
help  them,  until  all  else  has  failed.  And  then 
they  cast  themselves  on  God.  No  little  boy 
ever  believed  that  the  water  in  the  old  mill- 
pond  would  hold  him  up  until  it  actually  did 
so.  He  will  grab  at  a  board,  or  a  compan- 
ion's leg,  or  at  a  straw  for  support,  but  never 
7 


lay  himself  out  flat  on  his  back  on  the  bosom 
of  the  water.  The  little  skeptic  !  I  have  been 
trying  for  two  years  to  teach  Little  Bill  that 
the  water  is  anxious  to  "help"  him  to  swim, 
and  he  is  still  positively  convinced  that  it  is 
trying  to  drown  him.  It  is  only  after  men 
have  cast  themselves,  in  some  deep  despera- 
tion, into  the  "everlasting  arms,"  that  they 
discover  their  helping  and  holding  power. 
They  are  the  only  safe  refuge  for  the  sufferer 
and  the  sinner. 

A 

cMinistering  as  of  the  strength  fohich 
God  supplieth  (/  Pet.  4  :  //). 

IT  IS  both  bad  morals  and  puerile  philoso- 
phy to  forget  that  strength  and  wisdom 
and  virtue,  and  life  itself,  proceed  from  God. 
Do  you  think  it  does  no  harm  to  the  son 
of  a  millionaire  to  spend  his  father's  fortune 
as  if  it  were  his  very  own,  and  he  had  earned 
it  with  his  hands  ?  It  generates  egotism.  It 
fosters  pride.  It  darkens  the  intellect.  It 
degrades  the  conscience.  You  never  saw  the 
son  of  a  rich  man  who  forgot  that  he  was  using 
the  money  that  his  father  supplied,  who  was 
not  either  a  fool  or  a  knave.  You  never  saw, 
and  you  never  will  see,  men  who  forget  that 
God  supplies  their  strength,  their  wisdom, 
their  virtue,  and  their  life,  who  are  not  in 
8 


some  way  mentally  or  morally  unsound.  The 
sea  must  not  forget  the  rivers,  nor  the  rivers 
the  clouds.  The  fruits  must  not  forget  the 
seed,  nor  the  seed  the  flower.  Man,  thou  art 
nothing  but  a  derivative  1  Make  the  best 
of  it! 

& 

Thanks  be  to  God,  <who  gvveth  us  the  %'ctoty 
through  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ  (  /  Cor,  15  :  57). 

"  WICTORY  !  "  That  is  the  battle-cry  of 
"  our  holy  religion.  "Victory"  over 
sorrow,  over  sin,  over  death,  through  our  Lord 
Jesus  Christ.  Happiness  (in  the  long  run) 
will  return  from  the  battle  with  sorrow  chained 
to  the  axle  of  its  chariot ;  righteousness,  with 
sin  ;  life,  with  death.  Therefore  smile  at  de- 
feat, yes,  laugh  at  disaster,  exult  at  death.  If 
death  grins  at  life  in  the  autumn,  life  laughs  at 
death  in  the  spring.  The  grave  grinned  hid- 
eously at  life  when  they  laid  the  dead  Saviour 
in  its  cold  embrace.  But  after  three  days  life 
laughed,  for  the  victor  tore  himself  from  its 
arms.  Yes,  he  has  brought  life  and  immortal- 
ity to  light.  We  see  it  now.  It  is  life,  not 
death,  that  rules  the  universe.  This  is  the 
supreme  power.  Its  final  triumph  is  assured. 
Victory  is  written  on  its  banners.  The  contest 
for  supremacy  is  long  and  terrible,  but  the 
issue  is  certain.  Listen  to  Victor  Hugo : 
9 


"When  I  go  down  to  the  grave,  I  can  say, 
like  so  many  others,  'I  have  finished  my  day's 
work,'  but  I  cannot  say,  '  I  have  finished  my 
life. '  My  work  will  begin  again  next  morning. 
My  tomb  is  not  a  blind  alley,  it  is  a  thorough- 
fare ;  it  closes  with  the  twilight  to  open  with 
the  dawn.  It  would  not  be  worth  while  to 
live  at  all,  were  we  to  die  entirely.  That 
which  alleviates  labor  and  sanctifies  toil  is  to 
have  constantly  before  us  the  vision  of  a  better 
world  appearing  through  the  darkness  of  this 
life. ' '     Isn'  t  that  the  cry  of  victory  ? 


The  times  of  ignorance . . .  God  overlooked;  but 
nom>  he  commandeth  men  that  they  should 
all  everywhere  repent  {Acts  17  :  30). 

THERE  is  no  greater  difference  between 
any  two  other  things  in  life  than  "then" 
and  ' '  now. ' '  The  responsibilities  of  yester- 
day cannot  measure  those  of  to-day.  ' '  Then ' ' 
the  opportunities,  the  knowledge,  the  power, 
was  so  much  less  than  "now."  Yesterday 
you  were  a  child,  to-day  you  are  a  youth  • 
yesterday  you  were  a  youth,  to-day  you  are  a 
man.  "Then"  we  could  excuse,  and  even 
wink  at,  your  carelessness  and  irresponsibility; 
1 '  now '  ■  we  shake  our  heads,  and  frown  and 
condemn.  Last  Sunday  I  found  a  half-grown 
JO 


youngster  hiding  in  the  hallway  after  Sunday- 
school  had  begun.  "What's  the  matter?" 
I  asked.  "I've  got  on  my  first  long  pants. 
and  I  don't  dare  go  in,"  he  replied.  He 
had  passed  an  epoch.  He'll  never  be  a 
knickerbocker  boy  again.  He  is  a  long-pants 
boy  now,  and  will  be  so  forevermore.  Father, 
mother,  brother,  sister,  teacher,  friends,  will 
expect  and  demand  more  of  him  than  before. 
His  knickerbocker  peccadillos  will  no  longer 
be  "overlooked"  or  "winked  at."  Life  was 
one  thing  then,  it's  another  thing  now.  There 
is  the  same  difference  between  a  boy  in  knick- 
erbockers and  long  pants  as  between  a  bird  in 
a  nest  with  a  mother  brooding  over  it  and  in 
a  meadow  with  a  hawk  hovering  above  it. 


& 


If  he  commit  iniquity,  I  %itt  chasten  him 
'with  the  rod  of  men  (2  Sam*  7  :  14)* 

TTUMANITY  has  not  yet  outgrown  the  rod. 
11  f  ( wnom  the  Lord  loveth  he  chasteneth. ' ' 
Every  rational  human  being  instinctively  de- 
spises a  professed  moral  system  in  which  ini- 
quity is  not  followed  by  the  lash.  Thieves 
would  not  dare  to  live  in  communities  where 
theft  went  unpunished.  What  could  hinder 
them  from  being  stolen  from  ?  Ah  !  It  always 
seems  so  strange  to  me  that  these  sentimental 
ii 


parents  who  shrink  from  inflicting  pain  on  dis- 
obedient and  wayward  children  are  not  afraid 
of  being  despised  for  their  weakness  (as  they 
are  morally  certain  to  be)  by  the  young  repro- 
bates whom  they  weakly  spare.  When  Little 
Bill  faces  his  father  (hair-brush  in  hand),  he 
has  such  a  feeling  of  awe  as  when  Moses  saw 
God  in  the  burning  bush.  He  beholds  the 
whole  moral  government  incarnate  in  that 
single  human  personality.  Do  you  mean  to 
tell  me  he  does  not  respect  and  love  it  ? 


cDa.cvid  inquired  of  Jehovah  (2  Sam,  2  :  I), 

\  \  THAT  makes  us  do  what  we  do  ?  Some- 
*  times  it  is  sheer,  blind  impulse.  We 
do  not  stop  to  question  or  debate.  How 
would  you  like  to  be  constituted  so  that  you 
could  do  so  always,  and  never  have  to  regret 
it?  Wouldn't  that  turn  life  into  a  holiday  ! 
It  is  coming  to  forks  in  the  road,  and  having 
to  choose  through  investigation  and  reflection, 
that  makes  existence  a  tragedy.  The  instant 
we  stop  to  "inquire"  we  suffer.  Profound 
mysteries  and  uncertainties  confront  us.  Of 
whom  shall  we  ask  the  way  ?  By  what  method 
shall  we  conduct  the  search  ?  Sometimes  peo- 
ple have  consulted  the  leaves  on  the  floors  of 
caves,  or  the  entrails  of  sacrificial  animals,  or 

12 


the  flight  of  birds,  or  the  position  of  the  stars, 
or  the  grounds  in  their  teacups.  Dunces  ! 
But  "  David  inquired  of  Jehovah."  Strange 
as  it  may  seem,  there  is  no  way  so  sure  to  find 
the  pathway  of  life  as  to  make  a  silence  in  the 
heart  and  consult  the  divine  Oracle  who  dwells 
there.  Other  guides  assist  us,  —  history, 
science,  experience,  friends.  But  often,  when 
all  else  has  failed,  we  find  that  strange  way  of 
inquiring  directly  of  Jehovah,  and  out  of  the 
unknown  he  speaks.  Nothing  is  so  wonder- 
ful as  this.  A  flash  of  light  breaks  up  out  of 
unilluminated  darkness.  Vague  feelings  in- 
stantly crystallize  into  clear  convictions.  A  wis- 
dom deeper  than  our  own  utters  an  augury  or 
pronounces  a  decree,  and  we  feel  that  it  is 
ex  cathedra.  It  is  the  voice,  not  of  the  soul 
itself,  but  of  the  God  within  the  soul.  And, 
after  all,  that  is  the  true  method  of  attaining 
wisdom.  This  is  not  to  scorn  or  reject  other 
methods.  It  is  to  supplement  them  by  the 
final  method. 

Go  thy  <way  for  this  time  (Acts  24 1 25 ). 

(~\F  THIS  present  moment  only  are  you 
^■^  sure.  No  man  ever  fully  grasped  that 
thought  without  being  shaken  by  it.  Now  is 
the  accepted  time ;  now  is  the  day  of  salva- 
tion. Nothing  is  more  fatal  than  the  habit  of 
13 


procrastination.  * '  Indulge  in  procrastination, 
and  in  time  you  will  come  to  this, — that,  be- 
cause a  thing  ought  to  be  done,  therefore  you 
cannot  do  it."  "  Let's  take  the  instant  by 
the  forward  top,  for  we  are  old  [some  of  us, 
alas  !  or  getting  so],  and  on  our  quickest  de- 
crees the  inaudible  and  noiseless  foot  of  Time 
steals  ere  we  can  effect  them."  And  yet 
"there  is,  by  God's  grace,  an  immeasurable 
distance  between  late  and  too  late. ' ' 


So  Saul  died,  and  his  three  sons,  and  his  armor- 
bearer,  and  all  his  men,  that  same  day 
together  (/  Sam,  SI  :  6), 

|  F  WE  could  only  suffer  alone  !  If  only 
*  these  Sauls  did  not  have  to  drag  others 
into  ruin  with  them  !  But  who  ever  heard  of 
a  man  who  fell,  as  an  apple  falls  from  a  tree, 
alone  ?  Our  lives  are  indissolubly  linked  with 
other  lives.  When  we  drop,  we  pull  them 
with  us.  Sometimes  we  pull  them  into  sor- 
row only.  But  what  sorrow  !  Do  you  think 
a  boy  can  be  discharged  by  his  employer,  or 
disgraced  in  his  school,  or  sentenced  to  the 
penitentiary,  and  not  involve  his  parents  and 
his  friends  in  his  pain  ?  And  sometimes  we 
drag  them  into  our  sins.  How  few  sins  we 
commit  alone  !  Almost  every  one  of  them 
14 


requires  a  confederate.  These  sinful  Sauls 
must  have  their  armor-bearers,  and  down  goes 
the  whole  company  with  the  leader.  "Saul 
died,  and  his  three  sons,  and  his  armorbearer, 
and  all  his  men. ' ' 

A 

Ye  once  walked  according  to  the  course 
of  this  'world  {Eph.  2  :  2), 

\17HICH,  by  the  way,  is  the  gait  of  most  of 
"  *  the  people  you  meet.  They  set  their 
pace  to  that  of  the  procession  in  which  they 
are  walking,  and  it  is  "according  to  the  course 
of  this  world. ' '  They  do  not  seem  to  realize 
that  there  is  any  other  world  or  any  other 
pace.  The  children  who  are  reared  down  in 
the  Alleghany  mountain  valleys  do  not  know 
that  people  anywhere  move  at  a  different  pace 
from  that  of  the  mountaineers  around  them. 
The  little  pickaninnies  down  in  the  "Black 
Belt ' '  do  not  dream  that  there  is  any  other  gait 
than  that  of  the  trifling  people  who  are  the  only 
ones  they  have  ever  seen.  Put  them  down  in 
New  York  or  Chicago,  and  the  streets  look 
like  a  race-course,  and  all  the  people  seem  on 
a  run.  Well,  there's  another  "world"  than 
this  we  live  in.  Its  inhabitants  walk  in  a 
swifter,  nobler  "course."  What  you  need  to 
do,  my  little  man,  is  to  catch  their  gait.  It's 
too  hot  a  pace  for  loafers  and  sinners.  You 
IS 


must  lay  off  every  weight  and  the  sin  that  doth 
so  easily  beset  you,  and  run  with  a  sublime 
patience  the  race  that  is  set  before  you,  if  you 
keep  the  gait  of  goal-winners  like  Paul. 


I  cheerfully  make  my  defence  {Acts  24  :  10). 

T  T  IS  a  first-class  law  of  life  never  to  be  put 
*  on  the  defensive, — if  you  can  possibly 
help  it.  Be  aggressive,  attack  the  enemy,  do 
not  be  driven  into  a  corner.  When  his  pupil 
complained  to  the  old  fencing-master  that  his 
sword  was  too  short  to  enable  him  to  make  an 
attack,  he  said,  ' '  Take  a  step  forward  !  take 
a  step  forward  !  "  And  yet  there  are  times  in 
every  man's  life  when  he  has  to  explain  his 
conduct.  Circumstances  conspire  to  put  him 
in  a  bad  light,  as  they  did  Paul.  But  how  few 
people  there  are,  comparatively,  who  can 
'  '  cheerfully ' '  make  their  defense !  We  have  not 
said  or  done  all  that  we  are  charged  with,  but 
a  little  word  or  a  trivial  deed  has  compromised 
us.  We  are  embarrassed,  we  are  confused,  we 
suffer  torture.  It  is  torture  !  What  sensations 
those  must  be  that  a  politician  has  to  suffer 
when  his  enemies  get  hot  upon  the  trail  of 
some  indiscretion  or  sin  !  Many  a  man  has 
been  held  back  from  accepting  a  nomination 
or  an  office  by  that  shudder  that  follows  his 
16 


remembrance  of  a  still  undiscovered  crime. 
"Suppose  they  should  digit  up,"  he  says,  and 
the  cold  sweat  starts  on  his  forehead.  Be  sure 
of  this  :  it  is  only  the  honest  man  who  can  make 
his  defense  "cheerfully."  If,  like  the  great 
Apostle,  he  has  a  conscience  void  of  offense 
toward  God  and  man,  he  can  look  his  defam- 
ers  and  persecutors  in  the  face  with  a  tranquil 
courage. 

A 

The  sacrifices  of  God  are  a. 
broken  spirit  (Psa.  51 :  17), 

'"'THERE  are  broken  spirits  and  broken 
spirits.  Do  not  misunderstand  God. 
It  is  not  a  soul  emptied  of  all  hope  and  pur- 
pose, willing  to  be  trampled  under  foot  by 
every  trouble  and  thwarted  by  every  obstacle 
of  life,  that  God  loves.  Like  your  heart,  and 
mine,  the  heart  of  the  Infinite  One  thrills  at 
indomitable  courage,  at  a  spirit  that  the  com- 
bined misfortunes  of  all  time  cannot  make 
quail.  If  God  can  despise  any  one,  it  is  the 
man  who  surrenders,  and  grovels  and  whines 
before  the  adversities  of  life.  But  there  is  a 
second  kind  of  broken  spirit.  The  world 
despises  it  as  much  as  the  first.  Nothing  can 
make  this  stupid  world  see  the  difference  j 
but  nothing  can  blind  God  to  it.  There  is 
no  other  moment  in  its  whole  existence  when 
17 


a  human  soul  is  so  beautiful  and  so  lovable 
as  in  the  moment  of  contrition.  There  are 
hearts  on  earth  that  can  harden  themselves 
against  penitence  and  contrition,  but  there 
are  none  in  heaven.  Dives  in  tears,  the  tears 
of  penitence,  would  have  found  as  warm  a 
welcome  among  the  angels  as  Lazarus  appear- 
ing in  the  bosom  of  Abraham.  The  key  to 
Paradise  is  a  tear.  But  it  is  a  tear  of  peni- 
tence, not  weakness. 


When  I  have  a  convenient  season, 
I  frill  call  thee  unto  me  (Acts  24  :  25). 

r^VlD  you  ever  find  a  really  convenient  sea- 
*-^  son  for  doing  a  disagreeable  task?  I 
have  hunted  for  such  seasons,  but  in  vain. 
There  are  almost  horribly  convenient  seasons 
for  doing  all  sorts  of  meannesses.  There 
seem  to  me  to  be  always  about  two  thousand 
agreeable  and  easy  moments  in  every  hour  for 
acts  of  genuine  devilment  on  my  part.  But 
one  has  to  hunt  through  about  two  years  to 
find  one  single  second  in  which  it  seems  as  if 
all  nature  had  conspired  to  make  it  easy  and 
pleasant  to  confess  a  sin  or  right  a  wrong. 
Other  things  come,  but  convenient  seasons  for 
penitence  —  never!  This  present  instant  is 
the  best  one  that  ever  will  arrive. 
.    18 


*But  abide  thou  fn  the  things  which 
thou  hast  learned  (2  Tim*  3 :  14), 

'"THE  thoughts  that  we  receive  from  noble 
*  men  and  women  ought  to  become  a 
habitation  for  our  souls.  As  a  matter  of  fact, 
every  man's  ideas  are  a  more  real  dwelling- 
place  than  his  own  home.  I  consciously 
retire  into  mine  a  thousand  times  a  day. 
Sometimes  I  go  into  this  structure  of  thoughts 
(that  I  have  woven  as  a  bird  does  its  nest) 
for  quiet,  sometimes  for  consolation,  and 
sometimes  to  shut  the  gates  and  make  a  fight, 
like  an  old  baron  in  his  castle.  There  are 
temptations  to  leave  the  old  abode,  of  course. 
There  is  a  wild  impulse  in  every  heart  to  run 
away  from  home  at  times.  We  get  tired  of 
seeing  the  same  old  furniture,  and  the  stupid 
patterns  on  the  wall.  We  see  other  houses 
finer  than  our  own.  It  is  so  with  our  thought- 
houses.  They  seem  weak,  inadequate,  and 
dreary.  We  sigh  for  other  and  looser  and 
more  dazzling  ideas  of  existence.  But  "stay, 
stay  at  home,  my  heart,  and  rest:  home-keeping 
hearts  are  happiest. "  Only  we  must  let  our 
houses  grow  with  our  growth,  like  a  snail's  or 
an  oyster's.  Do  not  build  them  too  rigid  and 
inflexible,  or  they  will  burst.  Say  what  you 
will,  nothing  is  better  about  our  thought- 
houses  than  the  ' '  assurance  that  comes  from 
knowing  of  whom  we  have  received  them." 
19 


Thoughts  that  sheltered  Jesus  Christ,  Paul, 
Martin  Luther,  and  my  parents,  are  good 
enough  for  me. 

'Behold,  I  tell  you  a.  mystery  (/  Cor.  15  :  51)* 

TNDOUBTEDLY  the  resurrection  of  the 
^  body  and  the  immortality  of  the  soul 
are  "mysteries."  And,  because  they  are, 
thoughtless  people  reject  them.  Now,  if  this 
is  a  good  reason,  let  us  reject  everything. 
For,  at  last,  everything  is  an  insoluble  mys- 
tery. When  we  want  to  express  our  idea  of 
the  absolute  simplicity  of  an  idea,  we  say, 
"It  is  as  plain  as  two  sticks."  But  nothing 
can  be  more  mysterious  than  those  very  sticks. 
Once  they  were  living  trees,  and  you  can  no 
more  understand  what  that  life  was  than  you 
can  understand  infinity  and  eternity.  Mystery 
hovers  over  all  things  here  below.  All  are 
shrouded  in  a  veil.  "  Every  grain  of  sand  is 
a  mystery;  so  is  every  daisy  in  summer,  and  so 
is  every  snowflake  in  winter.  But  upwards 
and  downwards  and  all  around  us  science  and 
speculation  pass  into  mystery  at  last."  The 
presence  of  mystery  is  no  ground  for  unbelief, 
it  is  rather  a  reason  for  faith.  The  common- 
est facts  and  laws  of  nature,  the  daily  provi- 
dences of  life,  are  as  full  of  incomprehensible- 
ness  as  the  deepest  doctrines  of  religion.  A 
20 


religion  without  mystery  would  be  as  repugnant 
as  a  seed  without  life  or  a  body  without  a  soul. 
There  is  no  religion  without  mystery.  God 
himself  is  the  great  secret  of  nature.  To  me 
the  beating  of  my  heart,  the  expansion  and 
contraction  of  my  lungs,  the  ceaseless  flow  of 
thought  in  my  brain,  are  as  staggering  as  the 
resurrection  of  my  body  after  death.  It  is 
these  very  mysteries  that  are  the  fuel  of  faith. 


S^jrn)  therefore  let  your  hands  be  strong, 
and  be  ye  Valiant;  for  Saul  your 
lord  is  dead  (2  Sam*  2:7)* 

THERE  seems  to  be  a  "therefore"  to 
everything.  How  tired  we  grow  of  these 
1 '  therefores '  * !  How  imperative  and  implaca- 
ble they  are  !  "Saul  is  dead,  a  new  king  is 
on  the  throne,  and  '  therefore '  you  must  be 
strong  and  valiant."  You  are  rich,  and 
"therefore"  you  must  be  benevolent.  You 
are  poor,  and  "therefore"  you  must  be 
economical.  You  are  a  master,  and  "there- 
fore" you  must  be  considerate.  You  are  a 
servant,  and  "therefore"  you  must  be  faith- 
ful. You  are  a  teacher,  and  ' '  therefore  ' '  you 
must  be  held  accountable.  You  are  a  pupil,  and 
1 '  therefore  ' '  you  must  be  respectful.  ' '  Every 
why  hath  a  wherefore,"    and  every  circum- 

21 


stance  a  "therefore."  New  duties  are  in- 
volved in  new  situations,  just  as  plants  are 
involved  in  seeds,  and  seeds  in  flowers.  Little 
Bill,  yesterday  you  were  in  kilts,  and  "there- 
fore" you  had  aright  to  play  from  morning 
till  night.  To-day  you  are  in  knickerbockers, 
and  "  therefore  "  you  must  go  to  school  and 
study.  To-morrow  you  will  be  in  trousers, 
and  "therefore"  must  begin  to  be  a  man, 
and  bear  "the  white  man's  burden."  The 
whole  moral  system  lies  in  that  word  "  there- 
fore. ' '  The  possession  of  power,  or  virtue,  or 
knowledge,  involves  responsibility  in  its  use. 
You  can  no  more  sever  the  latter  from  the 
former  than  you  can  detach  a  quality  from  a 
substance. 

A 

SMight  become  such  as  I  am, 
except  these  bonds  {Acts  26  :29). 

TT  TAKES  a  profound  conviction  that  one  is 
*  right  to  sustain  one  in  that  wish.  Could 
you  wish  that  your  dear  friends  were  such  as 
you  are  ?  Are  your  convictions  and  ideas  and 
faiths  so  sweet  and  satisfying  that  you  could 
say,  as  Paul  did,  "I  wish  that  you  might  be- 
come such  as  I  am"  ?  If  not,  of  course  you 
have  no  power  in  the  advocacy  of  your  phi- 
losophy of  life.  Get  right  with  yourself,  get 
right  with  your  fellow-men,  get  right  with  God, 


get  a  clear  conscience,  get  a  happy  heart,  and 
then  you  will  also  get  persuasive  power.  A 
captain  who  knows  that  his  boat  leaks,  puts  up 
a  weak-kneed  plea  for  passengers.  It  is  not 
an  easy  thing  for  a  father  to  urge  his  boys  to 
be  such  as  he  is,  if  he  chews  tobacco  and 
drinks  beer. 

'Render  to  all  their  dues  (Rom.  13  :  7). 

PERHAPS  no  man  ever  yet  realized  the 
extent  of  his  obligations.  Your  obliga- 
tions are  not  limited  by  your  appreciation  of 
them.  They  are  limited  only  by  your  powers 
to  do  good.  It  is  the  duty  of  every  tallow 
dip  and  of  every  electric  light  to  throw  its 
beams  as  far  as  it  can.  We  know  all  about 
the  obligations  others  owe  to  us.  How  exact- 
ing we  are  of  those  courtesies  and  duties  ! 
pitifully  and  contemptibly  so,  I  think.  How 
little  our  Saviour  had  to  say  about  our 
"rights,"  and  how  much  about  our  "  obliga- 
tions." He  did  not  demand  his  "pound 
of  flesh"  from  his  creditors,  but  gave  his 
whole  body  to  his  debtors.  However  much 
one  may  sympathize  with  the  wage-earners  in 
their  clamorous  demands  for  their  "rights," 
it  makes  him  sick  at  heart  to  hear  so  little 
from  their  lips  about  their  "duties."  Chris- 
tianity is  a  steady  and  determined  will  to  give 
23 


to  others  what  belongs  to  them,  not  to  exact 
from  them  what  belongs  to  us.  Good  neigh- 
borliness  does  not  consist  in  the  determination 
to  keep  your  neighbor's  hens  out  of  your 
garden,  but  to  keep  yours  out  of  his.  Duties 
are  reciprocal, — oh,  yes  !  But  we  have  no 
need  of  a  gospel  to  teach  us  to  exact  our  ob- 
ligations, but  only  to  fulfil  them! 


cAgainst  thee,  thee  only,  hawe 
I  sinned  (Psa.  51  :  4). 

f  DO  not  myself  know  just  what  sin  is  against 
God — alone.  All  the  sins  that  I  know, 
besides  being  against  God,  are  also  against 
some  other  person  or  our  own  selves.  But  it 
is  easy  to  understand  how,  in  some  impas- 
sioned moment  of  clarified  vision,  all  con- 
sciousness of  any  other  wrong  is  swallowed  up 
in  that  of  wrong  against  God.  Mark  you, 
though,  that  it  takes  moral  natures  of  the 
highest  order  to  attain  this  knowledge,  the 
products  of  the  most  thorough  spiritual 
education.  What  insight,  imagination,  illumi- 
nation, are  required  to  trace  the  effect  of  our 
sins  on  the  heart  of  God!  It  is  like  being  told 
that  the  waves  from  a  pebble  break  on  the 
farthest  shore  of  ocean.  Both  waves  and  sins 
seem  dissipated  and  lost  before  reaching  their 
24 


destination.  And  yet,  as  every  telephone 
message  passes  through  the  central  station, 
every  evil  deed  and  word  and  thought  passes 
through  the  heart  of  God.  Every  wire  runs 
into  his  bosom.  Little  Bill,  you  are  listening 
to  me  incredulously.  You  do  not  see  how 
your  evil  deeds  can  sadden  the  heart  of  God. 
Well,  you  did  not  see  how  they  could  sadden 
mine  until  you  saw  me  break  down  and  weep, 
the  other  day.  Why  should  I  care  what  you 
do?  Why  should  a  pang  shoot  through  my 
heart  ?  I  do  not  know,  but  it  does.  And  it 
is  no  more  wonderful  that  this  pain  strikes 
through  the  heart  of  your  other  Father. 


Vzzah  put  forth  his  hand  to  the  ark  of 
God*  ♦  .  .  And  God  smote  him  there 
for  his  error  (2  Sam*  6  :  6,7), 

HPHERE  is  a  skeptical  distrust  of  God's  abil- 
ity to  carry  his  church  over  the  rough 
places  in  the  journey  that  results  in  immeasur- 
able harm \  for,  in  trying  to  keep  it  from  fall- 
ing by  the  way,  men  stretch  forth  their  hands 
to  deeds  of  actual  impiety.  In  this  present 
period  many  a  good  man,  troubled  and  scared 
by  the  prospect  of  the  church's  overthrow,  has 
tried  to  prop  it  up  with  sensational  preaching, 
or  questionable  methods  of  business,  or  alien 
25 


institutions.  All  such  things  are  extraneous. 
They  become  a  hindrance  and  drag  to  the 
progress  of  the  kingdom.  There  is  a  sense  in 
which  the  church  of  Christ  cannot  prosper 
without  the  support  of  the  hand  of  every  child 
of  God,  but  there  is  also  a  sense  in  which  it 
will  go  forward  on  its  way  as  surely  as  the 
revolving  earth  itself, — which  we  ride  on,  and 
cannot  sustain  by  lifting  nor  hasten  by  push- 
ing. Perhaps  a  good  motto  for  the  church  of 
this  age  would  be,  "  Impious  Uzzahs,  hands 
off!" 

Inquired  %>ho  he  was,  and  %>bat 
he  had  done  (Acts  21 :  33), 

OOONER  or  later  we  shall  all  of  us  have  to 
*^  answer  that  twofold  question,  "  Who  are 
you,  and  what  have  you  done  ?  ' '  What  have 
you  done  ?  This  is  what  the  world  insists  on 
knowing.  It  is  not  enough  that  you  are  some- 
thing, you  must  do  something.  Society  wants 
the  man  who  has  sung  a  song,  or  written  a 
book,  or  explored  a  country,  or  organized  a 
crusade,  or  who  can  do  it.  In  the  business 
world  or  in  politics  it  is  just  the  same.  What 
work  have  you  done  ?  What  word  have  you 
uttered  ?  The  world  needs  work  done.  It 
judges  men,  not  by  their  profession,  but  by 
their  accomplishment.  And  a  great  thing  it  is 
26 


to  have  done  something, — won  a  battle,  built 
a  bridge,  organized  a  Sunday-school,  cleared 
a  farm,  dug  a  well  or  even  a  ditch.  How  can 
any  one  bear  to  think  of  dying  without  having 
made  his  mark  on  the  earth  somewhere, — 
having,  as  it  were,  written  his  autograph  in 
nature's  album  in  some  task  that  can  never  be 
erased  ?  Then  comes  the  other  question, 
"  Who  are  you  ?  "  A  thousandfold  more  im- 
portant in  God's  sight  than  the  other  one,  for 
he  "  looks  not  upon  the  outward  appearance, 
but  on  the  heart."  Many  a  man  that  has 
done  the  greatest  deeds  in  history  has  no  more 
value  in  the  eyes  of  God  than  a  puff  of  smoke, 
while  many  a  quiet,  gentle  soul,  that  has 
patiently  spent  its  life  in  bed,  is  cherished  in 
the  heart  of  the  Eternal  as  a  saint. 


For  Jehovah  %>ttl  not  forsake  his 
oeople  (/  Sam,  12  :  22). 

NT  OT  so  long  as  there  is  a  single  purpose  in 
the  heart  of  man  for  him  to  hold  on  to! 
I  think,  myself,  that  the  grip  of  God  on  the 
human  soul  is  like  the  grip  of  gravity  on  mat- 
ter,— not  an  atom  of  which  ever  gets  away.  It 
is  ground  to  imponderable  powder ;  burnt  into 
impalpable  smoke  j  melted  into  invisible 
vapor  j  it  is  tossed  about  and  hidden  and 
27 


transformed  ;  but  it  never  gets  away  from  the 
grip  of  gravity.  Samuel  seemed  to  feel  that 
way  about  the  souls  of  men,  and  I  do  too. 
God  will  never  forsake  them.  So  don't  get 
discouraged  and  let  go  your  hold  of  him  who 
never  lets  go  his  hold  of  you  !  Neither  do 
your  true  friends  ever  forsake  you.  You  for- 
sake them, — that  is  the  trouble.  You  may 
not  believe  it,  but  there  are  more  people  in 
the  world  like  this  good  old  Samuel  than  you 
know  anything  about. 


<But  lighting  upon  a  place  where  two 
seas  met,  they  ran  the  'vessel 
aground  {Acts  27  :  41), 

"THIS  is  what  the  doctors  call  "  heroic  treat- 
*  ment."  But  nobody  can  deny  that,  in 
many  of  life's  most  significant  ventures,  the 
only  way  to  save  the  crew  is  to  scuttle  the  ship 
or  run  it  on  to  the  shore.  Many  a  man  is  be- 
ing dragged  down  to  financial  ruin  by  a  bad 
business  location  which  he  hasn't  the  courage 
to  desert.  Perhaps  the  waters  of  a  river  run 
into  his  cellar ;  perhaps  the  business  center  of 
the  city  has  moved.  He  hangs  on  and  on,  in 
hope  of  changes  that  never  come,  and  finally 
goes  down  under  the  ruin.  He  had  better 
have  run  his  vessel  aground,  and  begun  life 

3$ 


over  again.  Perhaps  he  has  engaged  in  a 
business  whose  immorality  he  did  not  perceive 
at  first, — as  so  many  get  into  saloon-keeping 
or  distilling  when  they  are  young  and  ignorant. 
At  last  his  conscience  has  been  enlightened, 
and  he  clearly  perceives  that  his  business  will 
wreck  him  morally.  But  the  question  of  bread 
and  butter  for  his  family  paralyzes  him  when 
he  tries  to  forsake  it.  He  holds  on  and  holds 
on,  day  after  day,  year  after  year,  until  he  has 
grown  hardened  or  discouraged,  and  the  good 
dies  out  of  his  soul.  How  much  better  it 
would  have  been  to  have  run  the  vessel 
aground  in  the  place  where  those  two  seas 
of  good  and  evil  met  !  It's  a  last  resort,  a 
desperate  remedy,  but  it's  often  the  only  one. 
So  slip  your  cable,  unship  your  helm,  run  your 
vessel  on  the  rocks ;  then  go  and  cut  down 
trees   and  build  a  better  one. 


cAnd  all  'went  to  be  taxed  {Luke  2  :  3), 

CVERY  living  thing  is  taxed,  and  all  willing 
workers  overtaxed.  The  baby  over- 
taxes its  mother  ;  the  growing  brood  of  chil- 
dren, the  father  j  his  parish,  the  preacher ; 
his  business,  the  merchant  j  his  patients,  the 
doctor  j  his  land,  the  farmer.  Well,  that  is  all 
right.  It  is  these  high  assessments  that  make 
29 


life  worth  while.  You  were  never  so  much  of 
a  man  as  when  you  thought  yourself  overtaxed. 
We  do  our  hardest  pulling  under  the  lash.  It 
was  better  for  Joseph  to  pay  more  taxes  than 
he  wanted  to,  and  to  a  government  that  he 
did  not  like,  than  not  to  pay  any  at  all. 


because  of  the  hope  of  Israel  I  am  bound 
frith  this  chain  {Acts  28  :  20), 

EVERYBODY  in  this  world  is  bound  with  a 
*^  chain.  None  are  at  perfect  liberty.  We 
envy  the  rich  their  independence.  They  seem 
to  be  able  to  move  about  the  world  with  the  free- 
dom of  the  birds,  and  to  do  whatever  they  take 
a  notion  to.  Do  not  deceive  yourselves.  They 
too  are  bound  with  chains.  Some  earthly 
limitation  is  on  them  all.  Their  chains  are  a 
little  longer  than  yours,  perhaps,  but  they  come 
to  the  ends  of  them  all  the  same.  Some  of 
them  are  sick,  some  of  them  are  sad,  and  some 
of  them  are  silly, — with  a  chain  bound  round 
their  brains,  which  is  enough  sight  worse  than 
a  manacle  on  one' s  leg.  No,  no  !  You  are 
not  the  only  one  who  bears  about  your  ball 
and  chain.  I've  got  mine.  But  let  me  tell 
you  this  :  It's  one  thing  to  be  bound  with 
chains  for  "the  hope  of  Israel,"  or  some  other 
great  and  sacred  cause.  Fathers  are  bound 
3° 


with  chains  for  the  hoDe  of  their  families, 
mothers  tor  the  hope  of  a  little  sick  baby, 
ministers  for  their  churches,  patriots  for  their 
country.  They  are  held  down  to  their  tasks 
like  slaves.  They  cannot  leave  their  little  cell. 
But  "the  hope,"  "the  hope,"  "the  hope," 
sustains  them  day  and  night.  It' s  quite  another 
thing  to  be  bound  with  the  chain  of  a  vile 
companion  or  a  vicious  habit.  On  the  prai- 
ries, the  cowboys  stake  their  horses  to  a  post. 
It  is  not  only  to  have  them  ready  to  mount  in 
the  morning,  but  to  keep  them  from  being 
stolen  by  Indians  or  eaten  by  wolves.  You 
had  better  be  thankful  to  God  for  "staking 
you  out." 

Jehdba.hf  the  God  of  Israel,  be 
Witness  (/  Sam.  20  :  12). 

T^HERE  is  nothing  more  overestimated  than 
secrecy.  How  few  deeds  are  ever  done 
without  a  witness  !  We  do  not  know  that  we 
are  observed,  because  our  deeds  are  not  im- 
portant enough  to  be  commented  on.  But 
let  any  one  of  them,  for  some  unexpected 
reason,  be  endowed  with  significance,  and 
witnesses  seem  to  spring  out  of  the  ground  ! 
Walls  have  ears ;  stones,  eyes  !  Vibrations 
seem  to  have  been  solidified  in  the  air, 
footsteps  petrified  in  drifting  sands,  ripples 
3i 


frozen  on  unstable  water.  Voices  are  heard 
on  every  hand,  crying,  "  I  saw  you.  I  saw 
you  ! M  Do  not  presume  on  secrecy.  Nature 
is  as  full  of  eyes  as  a  peacock's  tail.  And  be- 
sides, "  There  is  an  eye  that  never  sleeps 
beneath  the  wing  of  night."  "  All  things  are 
naked  and  laid  open  before  the  eyes  of  him 
with  whom  we  have  to  do."  Jonathan  was 
right.  God  is  witness, — witness  of  your 
friendships,  of  your  hatreds,  of  your  jeal- 
ousies ;  witness  of  your  deeds  and  words  and 
thoughts.  Truer  than  the  truth  "I  see  my- 
self," is  the  truth  "God  sees  me." 


Sa.iv  his  face  as  it  had  been  the 
face  of  an  angel  (Acts  6  :  15), 

A  N  UGLY  statue  or  painting  must  be 
always  ugly,  but  there  was  never  a  living 
countenance  so  hideous  that  an  inner  light  of 
love  might  not  transfigure  it.  The  homeliest 
are  sometimes  the  most  beautiful  when  a  reli- 
gious light  shines  through  the  features  like  the 
flames  of  candles  through  cathedral  windows. 
"  Her  face  is  like  the  milky- way  i'  the  sky, — 
a  meeting  of  gentle  lights  without  a  name," 
said  Sir  John  Suckling  of  one  of  his  heroines. 
How  many  nameless  gentle  lights  meet  and 
glow  in  faces  like  Stephen's!  I  have  seen 
32 


lights  beam  in  the  faces  of  some  I  know  that 
was  not  the  molten  matter  of  any  sun,  but 
a  scintillation  from  the  burning  heart  of  God 
himself, — a  light  divine  and  inextinguishable. 


c4nd  gave  him  fstbor  in  the  sight 
of  the  keeper  {Gen.  39 :  21). 

\A7E  SOON  enough  find  that  there  are  cruel 
and  relentless  forces  working  against  us, 
throwing  us  into  pits  and  prisons.  What  we 
need  is  to  believe  in  the  forces  that  are  work- 
ing for  us,  giving  us  the  kindness  and  favor  of 
men,  and  the  benefit  of  the  powers  of  nature. 
When  the  wind  blows  your  ship  backward, 
do  not  think  everything  is  against  you.  Re- 
member that  the  engine  is  for  you,  the  rudder 
is  for  you,  the  buoyancy  of  the  water  is  for 
you,  and  a  thousand  other  things.  While  you 
are  pegging  away  at  your  task  (misunderstood, 
abused,  despised),  there  is  a  good  friend  or 
two  saying  kind  words  behind  your  back. 
Some  one  is  planning  a  "rise."  Did  you 
ever  stop  to  think  of  all  the  forces  that  were 
working  "out  of  the  sight"  of  such  men  as 
Washington  and  Lincoln  to  push  them  forward 
and  upward  ?  There  are  more  for  us  than 
against  us.  And,  at  any  rate,  if  the  Lord  be 
for  us,  who  can  (successfully)  be  against  us  ? 
33 


You  and  God  can  defy  the  universe.  Be- 
lieve in  the  unseen  ><ood  more  than  the  un- 
seen evil. 

& 

cBeing  moved  'with  jealousy  (Acts  17  :  5). 

V\/E  CALL  the  "feelings"  of  our  souls 
"*  "emotions,"  because  they  move  us. 
They  are  steam  in  the  boilers  of  these  human 
engines.  They  furnish  driving  power.  Noth- 
ing is  more  certain  than  that  emotions  will 
move  us — to  something,  to  either  good  or 
bad.  Beware,  then,  of  jealousy.  Do  not 
flatter  yourself  that  it  will  lie  dormant  in  your 
heart.  It  is  a  fierce  and  terrible  energy.  It 
is  like  a  keg  of  powder  waiting  for  a  spark. 
It  will  drive  you  to  some  dark  and  desperate 
deed,  as  it  did  those  Jews.  Jealousy  is  a  fire; 
extinguish  it.     It  is  a  snake  ;  scotch  it. 


The  Lord  hath  need  of  them  {Matt.  21 :  3). 

T  F  WE  could  have  two  divinely  inspired  apos- 
*  ties  appear  to  us  and  say.  "The  Lord 
hath  need  of  this,  and  the  Lord  hath  need  of 
that,  and  the  Lord  hath  need  of  the  other," 
the  most  difficult  element  of  duty-doing  would 
vanish.  There  are  not  a  few  people  in  the 
world  who  find  it  much  harder  to  know  what 
34 


they  ought  to  give  up  than  to  give  up  what 
they  know  they  ought  to.  Life,  however, 
must  not  be  made  too  easy  for  us.  We  must 
learn  by  experience  and  insight  to  know 
what  our  Lord  demands.  Our  fathers  and 
mothers  and  teachers  will  not  always  live 
to  tell  us.  And  we  must  learn,  also,  that 
it  is  none  the  less  true  that  the  Lord  hath 
need  of  many  things  that  we  possess,  and 
can  perform,  when  he  does  not  appear  to  us 
himself,  nor  even  send  an  apostle.  God's 
needs  are  manifested  through  the  needs  of 
others.  All  real  helplessness  is  a  "sight 
draft ' '  from  the  Lord  upon  every  man  to 
whom  it  is  presented. 


His  mother  kept  all  these  sayings 
in  her  heart  {Luke  2  :  51), 

''"THERE  is  as  much  difference  between 
*  keeping  sacred  words  in  the  head  and 
the  heart  as  between  hanging  seed-corn  in  the 
kitchen  and  planting  it  in  the  ground,  or  be- 
tween keeping  coal  in  the  scuttle  and  putting 
it  in  the  grate.  You  may  keep  the  multiplica- 
tion-table in  your  head,  but  the  Golden  Rule 
must  be  cherished  in  the  heart.  When  we 
commit  things  to  memory,  they  may  do  us  as 
little  good  as  the  documents  do  the  tin  box  to 
35 


which  we  commit  them  in  the  safety  deposit 
vaults.  But  the  last  words  your  father  said  to 
you,  or  the  prattle  from  the  lips  of  your  little 
child,  went  straight  to  your  heart,  and  there 
they  abode  and  blessed  you,  coming  up  fresh, 
beautiful,  and  inspiring  day  after  day  and 
year  after  year.  Isn't  it  a  beautiful  mystery? 
Oh,  learn  the  divine  art  of  committing  sayings 
to  your  heart ! 

7*  <wtlt  not  let  thee  go,  except 
thou  bless  me  (Gen.  32  :  26), 

T  F  WE  should  wrestle  in  that  spirit  with  every 
incident  and  every  accident,  every  person 
and  every  object,  every  angel  and  every  devil, 
we  meet  in  life,  we  would  learn  a  wonderful 
secret,  and  it  would  be,  that  in  each  there  is  a 
sublime  lesson  and  an  eternal  benediction. 
Try  it  !  You  are  now  facing  some  great  dis- 
aster. Grapple  with  it,  analyze  it,  turn  it  in- 
side out,  ransack  its  secret,  hunt  for  its  con- 
cealed meaning.  Say  to  it,  as  you  seize  it  by 
the  throat,  "If  it  takes  me  ten  years,  or  for- 
ever, I  will  not  let  you  go  until  I  see  the  part 
you  were  sent  to  play  in  my  life."  You  will 
find  it.  It  will  disclose  itself  at  last.  As  surely 
as  there  is  fire  in  every  flint,  there  is  blessing 
in  every  experience.  There  are  some  in  which 
there  are  curses,  and  terrible  ones  at  that. 
36 


But  even  those,   if  a  man  grapples  them  as 
Jacob  did,  may  be  made  to  yield  some  blessing. 


Go,  and  do  thou  likewise  {Luke  10 1  37). 

T  T  IS  very  astonishing  to  know  how  many 
*  people  can  admire  a  good  deed  without 
feeling  any  disposition  to  try  and  imitate  it. 
There  is  always  some  reason  why  they  could 
not  possibly  do  it.  It  would  be  so  much 
harder  for  them.  "  It  did  not  cost  the  person 
who  did  it  any  effort, — don't  you  know?* 
For  shame  !  Good  deeds  do  not  come  easy 
for  any  one.  If  you  don't  say  to  yourself, 
when  you  see  a  good  deed,  "I  will  do  that 
myself  when  I  get  a  chance,"  there  is  some- 
thing wrong  with  your  machinery,  and  you  had 
better  have  it  repaired. 


He  entered  into  a  boat,  •  .  ♦  And  he 
spake  to  them  (Matt.  13  :  2,  3). 

A  NY  place  was  a  good  enough  pulpit  for  Jesus 
**  Christ.  If  there  was  a  synagogue  within 
reach,  he  went  there.  If  not,  he  preached 
from  the  top  of  a  hill,  or  a  curbstone,  or  a 
fishing-boat.  Men  and  boys  and  girls  who  are 
dead  in  earnest  always  find  a  weapon  or  an 
37 


instrument,  and,  if  not,  they  make  one.  When 
Samson  found  himself  without  a  sword,  he 
snatched  up  the  jawbone  of  an  ass.  A  ram's 
horn  was  good  enough  for  Joshua,  and  a  lamp 
and  pitcher  for  Gideon.  "Give  me  a  lever 
long  enough,  and  a  fulcrum  strong  enough, 
and  I  will  move  the  world  ! ' '  said  the  old 
philosopher.  If  a  little  friend  of  mine  had 
been  there,  he  would  have  said  :  "  Get  your 
own  lever.  Don't  wait  for  some  one  else 
to  find  it.  Any  old  thing  will  do, — if  you  are 
stout  enough.  Don' t  you  know  yet  that  it  is 
not  the  gun,  but  the  man  behind  it?  '*  Some 
one  saw  the  sword  of  Scandenberg,  and  said, 
"That  is  not  much  of  a  sword,"  and  one  of 
the  hero's  old  companions  said,  "You  ought  to 
have  seen  the  arm  that  wielded  it  !  "  Some 
sermons  are  better  from  a  stump  than  others 
from  a  carved  oak  pulpit. 

& 

Separate  me  Barnabas  and  Saul  (Acts  13  :  2). 

OOONER  or  later  every  individual  gets  sifted 
*^  out  of  the  crowd.  A  man  is  a  unit,  not 
a  part  of  a  mass.  An  apple  lies  down  at  the 
bottom  of  a  barrel,  lost  in  the  pile,  but  by  and 
by  its  turn  comes  to  be  taken  out  and  peeled 
and  eaten, — all  alone.  A  little  boy  at  first 
cannot  distinguish   his   own   identity.      He   is 

38 


swallowed  up  in  the  unity  of  the  family;  then 
he  is  detached,  and  sent  to  school.  Now  he  is 
a  part  of  a  throng  of  happy  youngsters  ;  but 
suddenly  he  is  wrenched  out  of  these  relation- 
ships, and  stuck  behind  a  counter,  or  into  an 
elevator,  or  into  a  street-car,  and  at  last  he  is 
an  individual !  And  so  the  process  of  separation 
goes  on.  We  are  sifted,  culled  out,  selected, 
set  apart.  It  is  serious  business,  this  "tread- 
ing the  wine-press  of  life"  alone.  But  God 
has  called  us  to  our  own  work,  and  not  to  an- 
other's. All  hail  the  day,  then,  when  he  comes 
and  takes  us,  and  says,  "Stand  here!  Go 
there  !" 

A 

Forasmuch  as  God  hath  showed  thee 
all  this,  there  is  none  so  discreet 
and  Tvise  {Gen*  41  :  39). 

A  S  THERE  is  a  beauty  in  character  which 
God's  originating  spirit  alone  can  account 
for,  so  there  is  a  wisdom  of  the  soul  which  can 
only  be  explained  by  his  indwelling  light. 
There  is  a  knowledge,  there  is  a  wisdom,  there 
is  a  discretion,  which  can  be  acquired  by  ex- 
perience and  education.  But  the  world  has 
always  insisted  that  there  is  another  sort  of  in- 
sight which  cannot.  Humanity  has  traced  it 
to  "inspiration,"  to  a  sudden  flash  of  light 
shot  into  the  soul  by  the  God  of  all  truth. 
39 


At  any  rate,  it  is  certain  that  the  greatest 
scholars  sometimes  lack  it,  while  it  is  often 
seen  scintillating  from  the  souls  of  the  igno- 
rant ;  and  it  is  the  verdict  of  all  the  past  ages 
that  " spiritual  things"  are  "spiritually  dis- 
cerned," and  that  "  holy  men  "  have  spoLen 
"as  they  were  moved  by  the  Holy  Ghost." 
If  you  wish  to  know  bird  lore,  you  dwell 
among  the  birds  ;  if  that  of  animals,  with  ani- 
mals ;  if  that  of  children,  with  children ;  if 
that  of  sages,  with  sages.  That  which  is  their 
essence  penetrates  you.  And  those  who,  wish- 
ing to  know  the  mind  of  God,  spend  much 
time  in  his  presence,  are  penetrated  by  his 
spirit  and  filled  with  his  wisdom. 


Who  ate  and  drank  with  him  after  he 
rose  from  the  dead  (Acts  10  :  41), 

f  ET  us  make  an  honest  effort  to  bring  this 
marvelous  fact  home  to  ourselves.  There 
were  men  who  ate  and  drank  with  Jesus  Christ 
after  he  had  risen  from  the  grave.  I  once  saw 
a  man  who  had  seen  Napoleon  Bonaparte. 
He  was  old  and  poor  and  ignorant,  but  when 
I  looked  into  his  eyes,  and  said  to  myself, 
"Those  eyes  have  actually  beheld  the  greatest 
genius  of  war  the  world  has  ever  produced," 
I  felt  almost  giddy,  it  made  the  life  of  that 
40 


prodigy  seem  so  awfully  real.  It  is  the  sense 
of  reality  that  we  need  in  thinking  of  Christ. 
There  is  a  way  of  quietly  bringing  this  fact 
"that  men  ate  and  drank  with  him  "  home  to 
the  heart,  so  as  to  almost  stop  its  beating  with 
wonder.  It  is  not  a  myth.  It  is  not  a 
baseless  legend.  No,  a  thousand  times  no  ! 
He  lived,  he  loved,  he  died,  he  rose  ! 


cAnd  Jacob  went  on  his  <way,  and  the 
angels  of  God  met  him  {Gen*  32  :  /)♦ 

OOMETHING  like  that  will  happen  to  every 
^  man  who  goes  on  his  own  way, — not  on 
the  path  marked  out  for  Napoleon  or  Wash- 
ington, but  for  him,  plain  John  Smith.  Not 
on  the  way  chosen  by  himself  against  the  will 
of  God,  but  chosen  by  God's  will  for  him, — 
the  strait,  narrow,  individual  path  to  the  goal 
of  his  own  personal  life.  Yes,  on  that  path 
God's  good  angels  will  meet  him  !  There  he 
will  encounter  the  angels  of  his  household, — 
his  wife  and  little  children.  There  he  will  find 
his  true  friends.  There  he  will  meet  his  joys 
and  his  sorrows,  his  failures  and  his  triumphs, 
his  losses  and  his  gains.  There  he  will  catch 
more  than  passing  glimpses  of  the  divine  pres- 
ence that  hovers  about  him  always.  Nothing 
is  so  sweet,  nothing  so  satisfying,  as  to  be  in 
4i 


the  "way"  your  feet  were  made  to  travel 
Do  not  leave  it  for  an  instant. 


/  send  you  forth  as  lambs  in  the 
midst  of  <wolcves  {Luke  10  :  3). 

HTHERE  may  be  more  kinds  of  animals  in 
*  the  human  race  than  just  lambs  and 
wolves  ;  but  these  two  varieties  predomi- 
nate. I  think  it  is  probably  right  to  try  to 
be  something  else,  but,  if  you  are  shut  up 
to  the  choice,  be  a  lamb  every  time.  Be 
bitten  rather  than  bite.  Oh  !  I  know  quite 
well  that  is  not  the  kind  of  advice  you  will 
hear  in  "Wall  Street,"  but  I  stick  to  it. 
Die  rather  than  wrong  or  rob  any  one. 
Patience,  gentleness,  love, — these  are  the 
powers  that  will  save  the  world.  The  lambs 
will  "win  out  "  in  the  long  run.  I  am  one  of 
those  who  think  that  sometimes  the  wolves 
have  to  be  hung  up  by  the  heels.  I  rather 
think  that  it  may  be  all  right  to  offer  a  reward 
for  their  scalps.  Saloon-keepers  must  be 
brought  up  with  a  sharp  turn.  Robbers  must 
be  shut  up  in  the  "pen."  Murderers  must 
be  electrocuted.  But,  after  all,  it  is  the  lamb, 
and  not  the  lion,  who  is  to  win  in  the  fight 
against  the  wolves.  It  is  more  often  by  being 
eaten  than  by  eating  that  we  bring  men  to 
42 


their  senses.  We  must  suffer  injustice,  if  we 
want  to  help  save  the  world.  It  is  "  heaping 
coals  of  fire  on  heads"  that  restores  brains  to 
reason.  Kill  men  with  kindness.  It  was  the 
unresisting  submission  of  Jesus  that  at  last 
broke  the  heart  of  humanity. 


blessed  are  the  pure  in  heart  (Matt*  4:8), 

COME  things  can  be  seen  through  the  brain, 
**-*  but  others  only  through  the  heart.  Sup- 
pose you  had  no  heart.  Do  you  think  you 
could  see  your  mother  ?  Do  you  think  you 
see  her  with  the  same  faculty  with  which  you 
see  the  multiplication-table  or  the  rule  for 
cube  root?  I  do  not.  If  you  should  come 
home  from  school  some  day  with  your  temper 
all  roused,  and  your  heart  so  full  of  mad  that 
you  could  scarcely  speak,  you  would  not  see 
your  mother  at  all.  You  might  look  at  her, 
but  you  would  not  really  behold  her.  You 
could  not  even  see  the  baby.  The  little  thing 
that  crawls  up  to  you,  and  that  you  feel  like 
slapping,  would  not  really  be  the  baby.  It 
would  be  something  else.  The  real  baby  would 
be  invisible  to  you  until  you  got  over  being 
mad.  That  is  why  we  say,  "I  was  so  mad  I 
could  not  see."  Something  really  blinds  the 
43 


eye  of  the  soul.  When  the  anger  all  runs  out 
of  your  heart,  then  you  can  see  again,  just  as 
when  the  frost  melts  from  the  window-pane. 
No  man  ever  saw  God  when  he  was  mad. 
No  man  ever  saw  God  when  his  heart  was 
full  of  vanity,  or  envy,  or  impurity.  He  sees 
something  vast,  awful,  ugly,  and  repellent, 
but  it  is  not  God. 


cAnd  he  dreamed,  a.nd  behold, 
3l  Udder  {Gen.  28  :  12). 

]\T  OTHING    could  be  more  true  or  more 
*  beautiful.      Just    as    every  road    in  the 

Roman  Empire  led  to  Rome,  every  line  erected 
on  earth  runs  straight  to  heaven.  Any  sun- 
beam, followed  to  the  end,  will  lead  us  to  its 
effulgent  source.  Just  as  any  little  Roman  lad 
could  step  out  of  his  door  and  strike  the  high- 
way with  absolute  certainty  of  reaching  the 
palace  of  the  Caesar  j  just  as  his  eye  may  travel 
on  the  sunbeam  from  his  own  bright  eye  to  the 
sun,  he  can  find  the  foot  of  a  ladder  on  the 
spot  where  he  stands  that  will  lead  him  straight 
to  heaven  and  God.  You  do  not  have  to  go 
to  Jerusalem  or  Mecca  or  Rome  to  find  the 
first  round  of  it.  Try  it  now.  Be  very  still  a 
moment.  Close  your  eyes  in  order  to  con- 
centrate your  thought.  Now  lift  that  thought 
44 


to  God.  Straight  as  the  sunbeam's  track, 
swift  as  its  flight,  you  are  in  the  divine  pres- 
ence. God  has  a  telephone  in  the  heart  of 
every  one,  and  you  need  not  call  a  central 
office  to  reach  him.  How  like  the  angels  go- 
ing back  and  forth  are  our  thoughts  and  his  ! 


Every  tree  therefore  that  bringeth 
not  forth  good  fruit  {Luke  3:9). 

""THAT  is  a  solemn  and  momentous  hour 
*  when  this  conception  of  life  bursts  into 
the  sluggish,  selfish  soul  of  a  man.  To  every 
earnest  man  it  comes.  He  hears  a  voice  say- 
ing to  him  :  "  The  hour  has  struck  when  thou 
must  stand  forth  and  show  what  is  in  thee. 
Reveal  thyself.  Thou  canst  no  longer  skulk  in 
the  rear.  Draw  thy  sword  !  Show  thy  hand  ! 
Bear  fruit  !  If  there  is  anything  in  thee,  go 
forward  and  upward  ;  if  not,  descend,  retreat. 
Make  place  for  better  men.  You  have  sat  in 
that  professor's  chair,  or  stood  in  that  pulpit, 
or  edited  that  paper,  or  headed  that  party, 
long  enough  without  getting  anything  done. 
Step  down,  laggard  !  "  When  these  thoughts 
thundered  in  the  soul  of  John,  he  left  the 
desert  for  the  haunts  of  men.  This  is  the 
trumpet  call  we  need.  More  men  need  to  be 
aroused  than  comforted. 
45 


If  ye  then,  being  <Ml,  know  ho<w  to 
give  good  gifts  {Matt.  7  :  II). 

A  LL  the  love  and  generosity  and  bountiful- 
**  ness  of  a  father's  or  a  mother's  heart 
comes  from  God  as  surely  as  all  the  luster  and 
glory  of  a  diamond  or  a  dew-drop  come  from 
the  sun.  If  they  are  kind,  it  is  only  because 
God  is  kind.  If  you  trust  them,  that  is  the 
reason  for  trusting  him  who  made  them.  But 
do  not  forget  that  love  sometimes  reveals  itself 
by  withholding  as  well  as  by  bestowing.  The 
eagle  shows  her  love  as  much  by  not  giving 
her  young  ones  a  fresh  rabbit  every  hour  or 
two  as  by  giving  it.  Perhaps  more  !  Perhaps 
I  would  rather  give  my  boy  ten  dollars  than 
see  him  get  down  into  a  ditch  and  dig  it  out. 
But  I  should  show  my  love  more  by  letting 
him  earn  it  for  himself. 


He  %>as  mofoed  %>ith  compassion  (Luke  10  :  33). 

\  \  7HAT  kind  of  compassion  is  it  which  does 
not  move  a  man  ?  What  kind  of  a 
mainspring  would  it  be  in  a  watch  which  did 
not  move  the  hands?  What  kind  of  steam 
would  it  be  in  a  boiler  which  did  not  move 
the  piston-rods?  All  the  great  emotions  of 
the  soul  are  "motor  powers."  But  in  some 
souls  these  emotions  are  about  like  a  little 
46 


trickle  of  sap  running  out  of  a  maple-tree  try- 
ing to  turn  the  water-wheel  of  a  great  big  mill. 
You  say  you  feel  compassion  ?  Well,  why 
doesn't  it  drive  your  feet  and  hands?  Feet, 
hands,  heart,  head, — everything,  ought  to 
commence  to  jump  and  whir  (just  as  things  do 
when  the  motorman  turns  on  the  current),  if 
the  compassion  is  genuine.  Compassion  is  a 
motor  power  or  nothing.  Don't  ever  say  you 
are  a  kind  man  unless  your  kindness  moves  you. 


What  God  hath  cleansed,  make  not 
thou  common  (Acts  11 :  9), 

Lf  ERE  lies  one  of  those  holy  mysteries  of 
*■  *■  the  spiritual  world,  which  I,  for  one, 
approach  with  the  same  wonder  and  reverence 
as  the  blooming  of  a  century-plant,  the  break- 
ing of  the  egg-shells  when  the  birds  come  forth 
into  life,  the  birth  of  a  little  child.  The  in- 
stant that  a  man  obeys  a  divine  command,  that 
moment  the  duty  ceases  to  be  irksome.  What 
a  transforming  touch  hath  this  sublime  virtue, 
obedience  !  The  dark  and  sombre  tasks  of  life 
are  flooded  with  light ;  the  arduous  and  repul- 
sive ones  are  made  easy  and  sweet ;  drudgery 
becomes  beatitude,  the  common  becomes  both 
clean  and  holy,  by  a  divine  magic.  I  wish  I 
could  cram  into  a  single  word  my  profound 
47 


conviction  that  the  most  common  things  of  life 
are  the  most  sacred.  The  tasks  we  most  in- 
dignantly spurn, — these  possess,  in  a  superla- 
tive degree,  that  holy,  blessed  element.  Dirt 
is  as  sacred  as  sunlight, — is  it  not?  In  what 
respect  does  the  digging  of  a  sewer,  to  drain 
off  the  poisons  which  threaten  human  life,  fall 
so  far  below,  in  dignity  and  sublimity,  the 
writing  of  a  book  or  painting  of  a  picture  ? 
The  " commonness"  is  in  the  mind  that 
scorns. 

Thou  sha.lt  not  Ml  {Exod.  20  :  IS). 

CVERY  moral  obligation  rests  back  finally 
upon  the  principle  that  life  is  sacred.  All 
life  has  a  certain  celestial  character,  and  never 
ought  to  be  taken  without  some  great  and  good 
reason.  The  lowest  forms  are  the  least  sacred, 
the  highest  the  most  sacred.  Even  the  life  of 
a  weed,  of  a  mosquito,  of  a  snake,  ought  not 
to  be  taken  without  reason.  The  increasing 
sense  of  this  sacredness  is  one  of  the  great 
hopes  of  the  modern  world.  Boys  are  getting 
more  incapable  of  killing  birds  and  squirrels 
than  they  used  to  be,  thank  God  !  The  most 
sacred  thing  in  the  world  (because  the  noblest 
form  of  life)  is  a  human  being.  To  rob  it  of 
its  life  is  the  consummation  of  evil.  And  now 
listen  to  this  :  Murder  is  the  logic  of  all  vice. 
48 


If  you  do  not  wish  to  be  a  murderer,  do  not 
cherish  any  vice.  Ambition,  avarice,  lust, 
jealousy,  bitterness, — there  is  not  one  of  them 
that  has  not  led  to  innumerable  murders. 
Give  them  full  scope  in  your  heart,  and  sooner 
or  later  you  will  find  them  hurling  you  in  some 
uncontrollable  passion  against  a  fellow-creature. 
What  a  mysterious  tendency  !  Who  can  ex- 
plain that  infernal  gravitation  of  every  vice 
toward  murder  ?  Little  Bill,  if  you  don' t  con- 
trol that  temper,  you  (yes,  you,  dear,  sweet 
little  Bill ! )  may  get  so  mad  some  day  as  to 
kill  a  man. 

cBeing  sent  forth  by  the  Holy 
Spirit  (Acts  13  :  4). 

THERE  are  times  in  the  lives  of  men  like 
Paul  and  Savonarola,  like  Moody  and 
Lincoln,  when  the  sense  of  being  flung  forth 
by  the  mighty  hand  of  God  upon  their  mission 
is  like  that  of  an  arrow's  feeling  the  thrust  of 
the  bow-string,  or  the  cannon-ball  the  impact 
of  the  powder.  When  Livingstone  plunged 
into  the  heart  of  the  Dark  Continent,  he  felt 
himself  thus  sent  forth  by  the  Holy  Ghost  ; 
and  there  isn't  one  of  us,  from  the  oldest  man 
to  the  youngest  child,  that  may  not  live  so 
conscientiously,  so  earnestly,  as  to  feel  that 
Holy  Spirit  speeding  us  on  our  way.  Just  you 
49 


do  to-day  (to  the  last  point  of  ifecuracy)  ex- 
actly what  you  ought  to  do,  and  you  will  feel 
like  a  ship  under  full  sail, — joyous,  bounding, 
exultant. 

Let  me  cast  out  the  mote  out 
of  thine  eye!  {Matt.  7  :  4.) 

r\F  COURSE,  there  have  to  be  critics  in 
^^  human  society,  just  as  there  have  to  be 
fly-papers  and  rat-traps  in  houses.  But  sharp- 
ening the  eye  to  look  abroad  blunts  it  for  look- 
ing at  home.  The  "  watch  "  on  the  masthead 
sees  other  vessels,  but  not  his  own.  Do  not 
be  a  critic  unless  you  are  called  to  it  by  some 
spiritual  necessity,  and  even  then  you  will 
need  to  pray  twice  as  often  and  as  hard  as  any 
other  person  in  the  world. 


What  doth  hinder  me  to  be 
baptized?  (Acts  8  :  36.) 

M  OTHING  !  There  is  no  hindrance  to  the 
performance  of  duty,  outside  of  one's 
own  soul.  Believe  that.  If  a  duty  is  impos- 
sible, it  is  not  a  duty.  God  never  puts  a  man 
in  a  situation  where  he  cannot  fulfil  the  behests 
of  his  conscience.  Trust  him  for  always  put- 
ting water  within  reach  of  the  man  who  feels 
that  he  must  be  baptized.  The  hindrances  to 
So 


the  divine  life  are  always  and  only  in  the  soul 
itself.  Do  not  blame  your  dereliction  in  duty 
on  other  people  or  on  Providence.  What  is  it 
that  hinders  you  from  confessing  Christ  ?  Your 
pride,  your  cowardice,  your  selfishness,  — 
nothing  else.  Do  not  be  deceived.  Face  the 
music.  "  If  you  are  not  satisfied  with  the 
face  you  see  in  the  mirror,  do  not  blame  or 
break  the  glass.* ' 

A 

cAnd  Abram  was  very  rich  in  cattle,  in 
silver,  and  in  gold  {Gen*  13  :  2), 

fJE  WAS  rich  in  other  and  better  things,  or 
*  *  that  would  have  been  little  to  his  credit 
or  his  profit.  They  are  but  the  means,  and 
not  the  end,  of  life  ;  the  instruments,  and  not 
the  objects.  Of  what  value  are  they  to  the 
man  who  has  not  the  noble  purpose  to  use 
them  for  good,  and  the  fine  sensibilities  to  ap- 
preciate their  true  meaning?  Of  what  use 
would  it  be  to  an  engine  to  be  rich  in  wheels 
and  cranks  and  pistons,  if  it  had  no  steam  ? 
Of  what  use  would  it  be  to  a  ship  to  be  rich  in 
sails  and  masts  and  ropes,  if  it  had  no  rudder  ? 
The  frightful  danger  in  the  accumulation  of 
cattle  and  silver  and  gold  is  that  the  man  will 
be  swamped  under  them.  "I  want  money 
for  what  it  will  buy,"  says  one.  "Do  not 
imagine  I  am  toiling  and  sacrificing  merely 
5* 


for  a  big  bank  account.  It  is  because,  in  my 
world,  commercial  supremacy  is  the  measure 
of  success,  and  I  want  to  make  my  life  a  suc- 
cess," says  another.  That  is  all  right,  if  you 
don' t  lose  sight  of  it.  But  the  love  of  cattle  and 
silver  and  gold  themselves  is  a  fearful  under- 
tow that  drags  the  soul  out  into  the  ocean  of 
avarice  and  drowns  it  there.  Beware  of  the 
undertow ! 

7be  ^vord  of  God  came  unto  John  {Luke  3:2). 

A  ND,  it  may  be  fearlessly  asserted,  it  has 
**  come  to  every  man  !  This  is  as  certain  as 
that  air  and  water  rush  into  vacant  spaces, — for 
God  is  everywhere.  The  sea-shell  may  not  be 
conscious  of  the  continuous  roar  within  it,  nor 
the  soul  of  the  ceaselessly  resounding  voice  of 
God.  Some  people  never  hear  the  birds  sing, 
but  there  are  others  who  never  miss  a  note, 
whether  the  fierce  scream  of  the  hawk  or  the 
gentle  twitter  of  the  sparrows.  Mrs.  Lordly 
behind  the  thick  walls  of  her  palace  does  not 
hear  the  merry  whistle  of  little  Jack  Thimble- 
rigger,  but  his  widowed  mother  in  the  vine- 
clad  cottage  catches  the  first  faint  note  as  he 
rounds  the  corner  a  block  away.  You  may 
not  hear  the  voice  of  God,  but  it  is  sounding  in 
your  ears  as  clearly  as  in  those  of  Samuel  or  of 
John. 

-  5* 


Who  can  forgive  sins  but  one,  even 
God?  {Mark 2:  7). 

]\JO  ONE.  They  were  right  Only  he  can 
*  ^  forgive  a  sin  against  whom  the  sin  has 
been  committed.  When  Ben  Brown's  little 
friend  accidentally  killed  Ben's  bantam  rooster, 
he  was  afraid  to  confess  it,  and  so  he  went  to 
Ted  Somers,  and  asked  him  to  forgive  him. 
Ted  said  he  would,  and  tried  to,  but  some- 
how he  couldn'  t.  Of  course.  You  might  as 
well  feed  a  chicken,  and  expect  a  kitten  to 
get  fat.  Your  father  cannot  forgive  you  for 
being  saucy  to  your  mother,  and  the  grocer 
cannot  forgive  you  for  running  away  from 
school.  If  you  have  sinned  against  God,  he 
can  forgive  you,  and  no  one  else  can.  The 
people  were  right.  This  was  exactly  what 
Jesus  was  always  teaching.  But  he  always 
asserted  that  he  could  forgive  sins  because  he 
was  God  manifest  in  the  flesh. 

SL 

They  therefore  that  <were  scattered  abroad  <went 
about  preaching  the  word  {Acts  8:4), 

'"PHE  mothers  must  often  push  the  birdlings 
out  of  the  nest  in  order  to  teach  them  to 
fly.  In  spite  of  the  beauty  and  glory  of  the 
gospel,  in  spite  of  the  natural  impulse  of  the 
soul  to  communicate  its  joys  and  its  discovery 
to  other  men,  it  is  a  fair  question  whether  the 
53 


religion  of  Jesus  would  ever  have  gotten  be- 
yond Palestine  if  it  had  not  been  for  its  perse- 
cutors. It  is  so  easy  to  stay  in  the  warm  nest. 
But  a  cruel  hand  flung  the  birds  far  forth,  and 
away  they  went  singing.  It  is  lack  of  an  in- 
come that  has  scattered  the  younger  sons  of 
English  noblemen  over  the  earth.  It  is  pov- 
erty that  has  scattered  the  peasants  and  lazza- 
roni  of  Europe  broadcast  over  the  New  World. 
Persecution  drove  the  Puritans  and  the  Hugue- 
nots to  America.  "Let  me  stay  here  in  the 
bin  !  "  cries  the  wheat  to  the  farmer.  "  Not 
much  !  "  cries  the  farmer  to  the  wheat  as  he 
flings  it  into  the  furrow.  Thank  God  our 
modern  missionaries  are  going  without  being 
driven  !  But  how  they  are  scattered  ! — from 
China  to  Japan  and  Corea,  from  India  to  Cey- 
lon and  Africa.  We  shall  have  a  harvest  that 
shall  make  the  reapers  shout  some  day. 


The  land  that  I  %M  shcfo  thee  {Gen.  12  :  /). 

T~\0  NOT  be  afraid  that  you  cannot  find 
*"^  your  place  in  the  world  !  It  has  been, 
or  is  now  being,  prepared  for  you.  God  will 
show  it  to  you  if  you  live  simply,  candidly, 
teachably,  and  go  forward.  Sometimes  he 
shows  it  to  your  instinct.  You  know  be- 
forehand what  you  ought  to  do  and  be,  and 
54 


the  minute  you  find  your  place  it  fits  you. 
Sometimes  you  have  to  be  jammed  into  it, 
because  you  won't  go  of  your  own  accord  ! 
Sometimes  he  shows  it  by  accident,  some- 
times by  necessity  ;  but  he  shows  it  !  There 
will  be  "signs."  You  will  find  the  burden 
fitted  for  your  back,  the  work  cut  out  for  your 
hand.  Do  not  hold  back.  Do  not  miss  the 
place  assigned  you.  Do  not  try  to  fill  an- 
other. Go  to  the  spot  on  the  sentry-beat,  or 
the  firing-line,  or  the  sutler's  camp,  or  wher- 
ever God  shows  you  your  place,  and  stand 
there  like  a  man  !  It  is  the  only  spot  on 
earth  where  you  can  feel  an  absolute  assurance 
and  peace. 

For  behold,  he  prayeth  (Ads  9  :  11), 

A  FTER  all,  that  is  the  mood  of  spiritual 
**  receptivity.  When  the  soul  opens  to 
emit  its  penitential  sighs,  the  smallest  aperture 
is  wide  enough  for  God's  blessing  to  enter. 
It  is  the  open  furrow  for  the  falling  seed. 
More  blessings  worth  the  having  and  keeping 
have  come  to  men  in  the  attitude  of  prayer 
than  in  any  other.  I  may  not  be  able  to  tell 
you  how  to  put  your  hard  heart  and  stub- 
born soul  into  that  state,  but  I  can  offer  you 
the  solemn  assurance  that  when  it  is  said  of 
you  in  heaven,  "Behold,  he  prayeth,"  help 
55 


will  be  sent  you  on  the  instant, — not  what  help 
you  sought,  perhaps,  but  just  the  help  you 
need. 

* 

Was  not  our  heart  burning 
Within  us  ?  {Luke  24  :  32.) 

r^O  WHEREVER  anything  makes  your 
^-*  heart  "  burn  "  like  that.  Join  yourself  to 
any  person  that  kindles  up  those  flames  in 
your  bosom.  What  these  icy  hearts  of  ours 
need  is  to  be  set  on  fire.  Nothing  will  make 
them  burn  like  contact  with  heroes  and 
heroic  deeds.  Get  close  to  Moses,  Elijah, 
Paul,  Savonarola,  Luther,  Lincoln, —  above 
all,  to  Jesus  Christ.  He  has  made  more 
hearts  "burn"  than  all  the  rest  together. 


cAt  e<ven,  ♦  ♦  ,  and  in  the  morning,  .  .  .  ye  shall 
see  the  glory  ofjehdbah  (Exod.  16  :  6,  7). 

Yf  ES,  and  that  glory  is  as  visible  to-day  as 
■  then.  If  you  do  not  see  it  in  the  dew 
that  sparkles  on  the  grass  at  daybreak,  and  in 
the  clouds  that  glow  with  opalescent  light  when 
the  sun  goes  down,  you  would  not  have  seen 
it  in  the  divided  Jordan,  the  bitter  waters 
sweetened  by  the  tree,  nor  in  the  falling  of 
the    manna,    and    the    quails.      This  glory   is 

56 


always  in  the  eye  of  the  beholder.  There  is 
as  much  of  the  glory  of  God  in  the  fish  caught 
from  a  lake,  or  the  kernel  of  grain  raised  in  a 
field,  or  the  loaf  of  bread  baked  in  the  oven, 
as  in  the  miraculous  food  that  fell  from  heaven. 
In  every  drop  of  water  there  is  the  majesty  of 
an  ocean,  in  every  star  the  beauty  of  a  uni- 
verse, in  every  child  the  grandeur  of  humanity. 
To  the  reverent  mind  the  glory  of  God  is  seen 
as  clearly  in  feeding  a  raven  or  clothing  a  lily 
as  in  satisfying  the  hunger  or  hiding  the 
nakedness  of  an  army. 


Repentance  and  remission  {Luke  24  :  47) 

'"THOSE  three  words  contain  a  mystery  and 
glory  of  which  I,  for  one,  never  tire. 
The  second  follows  the  first  by  a  sort  of  auto- 
matic movement.  If  you  can  get  a  mind  to 
repent,  remission  follows  just  as  sure  as  sound 
follows  shooting  a  cannon,  or  light  the  striking 
of  a  flint  and  steel.  Don't  you  bother  about 
the  remission  —  you  just  repent  !  Just  as 
you  sow  seed  and  let  God  bring  forth  the 
plant,  you  have  only  to  hate  your  sin,  and 
turn  from  it,  and  he  will  bestow  the  pardon. 
This  beautiful  mystery,  this  marvelous  bit  of 
spiritual  mechanism,  is  what  Christ  came  to 
disclose  to  us.  Forgiving  love  is  the  essence 
57 


of  God's  nature.  He  can  no  more  with- 
hold forgiveness  to  a  penitent  than  a  mother 
can  withhold  a  kiss  from  the  infant  lips  that 
are  lifted  to  hers.  To  pardon  is  an  irrepres- 
sible divine  instinct.  God  pardons  in  the 
heavens  as  Christ  pardoned  on  the  cross. 


cAnd  be  thou  a  blessing  {Gen,  12  :  2), 

A  BOUT  three  times  a  day,  each  one  of  us 
*^  might  profitably  pause  to  ask,  "Am  I 
really  a  blessing  to  my  friends  ?  ' '  Think  of  the 
millions  who  are  positive  curses  to  their  loved 
ones  !  And  they  are  so  often  unconscious 
of  it !  Some  of  us  are  neither  one  thing  nor 
another.  It  doesn't  make  much  difference 
whether  we  live  or  die.  But  now  and  then 
we  find  some  one  who  is  a  positive  and  un- 
mitigated blessing  !  Sometimes  it  is  an  obedi- 
ent little  child  ;  sometimes  a  noble  youth  ; 
sometimes  a  great-hearted  man  or  woman  in 
middle  life ;  sometimes  an  old  grandfather  or 
grandmother.  They  radiate  light  and  heat. 
They  shed  joy  and  peace.  Every  one  is  hap- 
pier and  better  the  minute  they  appear.  The 
canary  sings  more  sweetly  j  the  horse  strikes 
abetter  gait;  the  household  affairs  go  more 
smoothly.  Whatever  else  you  are,  or  are  not, 
try  to  be  a  blessing  !     You  can  be  this  even 

58 


if  you  are  poor,  even  if  you  are  lame,  even 
if  you  are  blind.  Nothing  can  prevent  you 
from  being  a  blessing  but  your  own  self ! 


'But  in  every  nation  he  that  feareth 
him,  and  <rvorketh  righteousness,  is 
acceptable  to  him  (Acts  10  :  35). 

T^HIS  verse  is  the  bed-rock  of  God's  moral 
*  system.  Before  this  statement  all  fine- 
spun systems  of  theological  ethics  go  down  like 
cobwebs  before  a  whirlwind.  Goodness  is 
goodness  in  earth  or  heaven.  Righteousness 
is  simply  Tightness,  and  God  can  no  more  help 
loving  it  than  you  can  help  admiring  beauty. 
It  is  "acceptable"  to  him.  It  "finds"  him. 
It  thrills  him.  There  are  not  two  kinds  of 
righteousness,  any  more  than  there  are  two 
kinds  of  straight  lines.  Do  right.  God  will 
not  reject  your  deed,  whoever  you  are. 
Courage,  tenderness,  unselfishness,  truthful- 
ness, purity, —  these  are  as  beautiful  in  the 
negro  or  the  Chinaman  as  in  the  white  man. 
When  done  because  that  divine  sense  of  duty 
welling  up  from  the  deeps  of  the  soul  impels 
them,  they  have  a  virtue  and  beauty  that  are 
irresistible.  They  are  permeated  with  the 
essence  of  religion.  All  true  morality  is  at 
least  unconscious  religion. 
59 


Sl&w  of  heart  to  believe  {Luke  24  :  25). 

I  HAD  rather  be  slow  of  wit  than  of  heart. 
*  Some  people  do  not  comprehend  an  argu- 
ment until  the  question  is  a  dead  issue.  Some 
do  not  see  a  joke  until  others  have  had 
their  laugh  and  forgotten  it.  Sorry  for  them  ? 
Of  course  !  But  it's  not  a  thousandth  part  as 
bad  as  to  have  a  snail-moving  heart,  slow  to 
respond  to  love,  slow  to  perceive  goodness, 
slow  to  accept  the  divine.  Some  people's 
sympathies  move  like  molasses.  I  like  to  see 
them  explode  like  powder.  I  like  to  see  them 
catch  hold  of  evidences  of  God's  love  and 
goodness  just  as  burrs  seize  upon  sheep's 
wool. 

Showing  the  coats  and  garments  <which 
Dorcas  made  (Acts  9  :  39). 

\1  7H AT  have  you  got  to  ' '  show  ' '  for  your 
™  ™  life  ?  What  will  your  friends  have  to 
"  show  "  when  you  are  dead  ?  Many  a  man 
and  woman  lives  through  the  whole  cycle  of 
life's  glad,  sad  seventy  years,  and,  after  van- 
ishing, "leaves  not  a  wrack  behind."  If 
their  "works  do  follow  them,"  they  follow  so 
close  and  swift  as  to  disappear  with  the  doer. 
It's  easy  enough  to  flatter  ourselves  in  hours 
of  vanity  that  we  are  of  inestimable  value  to 
6o 


the  world,  but  sit  down  with  your  conscience, 
and  ask  yourself,  "What  would  my  friends 
have  to  '  show  '  if  I  should  die  to-night  ?  ' ' 
What  have  you  done  ?  Think  of  all  that 
has  been  spent  and  wasted  to  produce  some 
of  the  unproductive  wretches  who  live  and 
die  on  earth.  What  toil  and  tears  of  par- 
ents and  teachers  and  friends,  what  tons  of 
good  bread  and  beef,  what  miles  of  rich  and 
valuable  clothing,  have  been  wasted  on 
them  !  And  now  they  are  gone,  and  their 
most  charitable  friends  are  empty-  handed  ; 
there  is  nothing  to  "show"  for  them.  It 
was  something  to  be  able  to  hold  up  those 
little  coats  and  garments,  and  say,  "She  did 
this." 


Thus  it  becometh  us  to  fulfil  all 
righteousness  (Matt.  3  :  15). 

IN  A  door-yard  an  empty  well,  in  a  kitchen 
an  empty  larder,  in  a  drawer  an  empty 
pocket-book,  in  a  nursery  an  empty  crib,  in  a 
workshop  empty  hands,  in  a  bosom  an  empty 
heart  j  or,  a  hive  full  of  honey,  a  tree  full  of  fruit, 
a  grove  full  of  singing  birds,  a  house  full  of 
children  and  music,  a  mind  full  of  knowledge, 
a  heart  full  of  love,  and  hands  full  of  good 
works !  Which  do  you  like  the  better,  emptiness 
61 


or  fulness?  It  is  time  to  stop  "fiddling" 
with  life,  "scratching"  the  surface  of  the 
field,  "dabbling"  with  a  profession,  "tri- 
fling" with  religion.  What  we  need  is  "to 
go  the  whole  figure,"  "fulfil  our  ministry." 
Test  truth,  goodness,  charity,  duty,  righteous- 
ness, to  the  very  utmost.  Let's  see  what 
there  is  in  a  life  crowded  full  of  struggle,  faith, 
hope,  love,  and  endeavor. 


cAnd  they  fumed  to  the  Lord  {Acts  9  :  35), 

TJOW  easily  and  instinctively  men  "turn  to 
A  the  Lord"  in  great  extremities  and 
great  opportunities  !  Watch  a  crowd  of  peo- 
ple when  the  life-saving  service  is  trying  to 
rescue  a  man  from  shipwreck.  They  "turn 
to  God,"  as  weather-vanes  turn  to  the  wind. 
You  can  hear  muttered  prayers  on  every  side. 
And  in  great  revivals,  when  the  love  of 
heaven  is  unburdening  guilty  consciences  and 
cheering  saddened  hearts,  how  the  multitude 
"turns  to  the  Lord"!  At  such  times  men 
know  that  God  is  everything, — the  great  mag- 
netic center  and  soul  of  the  universe  ;  the 
source  of  life,  of  joy,  of  hope.  Only  turn. 
"Turn  ye  !  Turn  ye,  for  why  will  ye  die?" 
If  you  were  God,  would  you  not  feel  as  he 
does, — that  the  sweetest  thing  on  earth  would 
62 


be  the  turning  of  human  hearts  to  you,  as 
the  flowers  turn  to  the  sun,  every  hour  and 
moment  of  its  shining  ? 


Thou  hast  nothing  to  dra<zv  <rvith  [John  4  :  11). 

AY,  THERE  is  the  rub  !  The  world,  like  a 
"**•  bountiful  well,  is  full  of  good  things,  but 
the  problem  is  how  to  get  them.  The  well  is 
deep,  and  so  many  people  do  not  have  the 
rope  of  money  or  brains  or  purpose  with  which 
to  draw.  I  am  not  much  of  a  political  econo- 
mist. The  whole  present  system  may  be 
wrong,  and  need  righting, —  I  don't  know. 
But  there  is  one  very  simple  way  of  getting 
things  into  better  shape  than  they  are  now. 
Those  of  us  who  have  ropes  can  lend  them  to 
those  who  have  not.  A  helping  hand  is  the 
longest  rope  in  the  world,  and  will  reach  the 
bottom  of  wells  so  deep  that  nothing  else  can 
touch  them. 

cAnd  I  will  Hess  thee  {Gen*  12  :  2). 

\\  7HETHER  you  believe  it  or  not,  every 
" "  man  that  is  born  into  the  world  may 
attain  beatitude.  Life  may  become  a  felicity. 
Perhaps  not  one  in  a  thousand  really  finds  it 
so;  but  this  is  because  they  do  not  "get  the 

63 


hang  of  it."  I  solemnly  affirm  that  I  have 
never  passed  a  single  day  of  life  at  the  close  of 
which  I  could  have  honestly  said,  "  Peace  and 
felicity  would  have  been  impossible  to-day." 
And  I  have  had  my  share  of  hard  ones,  too. 
Nor  do  I  believe  that  you  could.  The  most 
terrible  calamities  contain  secret  blessings,  as 
the  hardest  shells  contain  hidden  nuts.  There 
is  "blessing"  in  life  as  surely  as  there  is  life 
in  sunlight.  It  is  in  the  nature  of  God  to 
"bless."  The  trouble  lies  in  our  inability  or 
unwillingness  to  accept.  How  few  people 
know  how  to  receive  favors  gracefully  !  Fewer 
still  know  how  to  be  blessed.     It  is  a  fine  art. 


For  God  <wds  <a>{tb  him  (Acts  10  :  38). 

A  ND  he  is  with  every  one  who  goes  about  do- 
ing  good.  Has  that  thought  no  splendors  ? 
Think  of  it !  After  you  trace  a  good  deed  (a 
truly  good  deed)  back  through  all  its  subtle, 
delicate,  and  often  hidden,  impulses,  you  come 
at  last  to  God.  What  is  it  that  prompts  men 
and  women  to  those  marvels  of  patience,  of 
devotion,  of  self-immolation,  that  starts  the 
blood  in  our  veins  and  brings  the  tears  to  our 
eyes?  You  say  patriotism,  love  of  offspring, 
sense  of  duty,  and  a  thousand  other  things. 
But  this  is  like  answering  the  question,  What 
64 


moves  the  wheels  of  an  engine  ?  by  saying, 
"  The  piston  rods."  Back  of  everything  else 
is  steam.  To  me  it  is  no  more  clear  that  it  is 
sunlight  which  paints  every  flower  and  ripens 
every  fruit  than  that  it  is  the  impact  of  God's 
own  presence  on  the  soul  that  produces  all 
good  deeds,  pure  thoughts,  and  loving  words. 


& 


We  have  sinned,  because  <we  babe  spoken 
against  Jehovah  (Num.  21  :  7). 

\  1 7HAT  a  happy  world  it  would  be  if  repent- 
* "  ance  always  followed  sin  instantly ! 
Suppose  that  wrong-doing  invariably  produced 
a  feeling  of  contrition,  just  as  over- work  pro- 
duces fatigue,  or  over-eating  nausea.  It  always 
does  when  the  heart  has  been  made  right  by 
the  love  of  God  in  Christ.  Without  that  won- 
derful alteration  in  the  soul  the  effect  of  sin  is 
strangely  different.  It  may  produce  shame 
and  guilt  and  fear,  but  always  and  everywhere 
it  only  makes  us  weaker  and  wickeder.  Take 
the  sin  of  " speaking  against  Jehovah."  The 
first  oath  terrifies  the  little  boy.  He  trembles. 
He  is  afraid  that  the  trees  heard  it,  and  will 
whisper  it  to  his  father ;  that  the  stars  heard 
it,  and  will  tell  it  to  God.  But  nothing  terri- 
ble happens,  and  he  tries  it  again.  This  time 
Ue  experiences  a  wild  pleasure  in  his  courage. 

65 


After  a  while  he  can  swear  every  time  he  wants 
to  without  fear,  and  soon  must  swear,  whether 
he  wants  to  or  not.  With  every  oath  he  grows 
coarser  and  more  insensible.  By  and  by  he 
glories  in  his  shame.-  Don' t  hope  that  sin  will 
cure  itself.  Clocks  don't  wind  themselves  up 
by  running  down,  and  neither  do  men.  Evil  is 
not  in  the  heart  like  water  in  a  basin  or  money 
in  your  purse.  You  cannot  empty  it  by  pour- 
ing it  out  or  spending  it.  It  is  in  your  life, 
like  the  muscles  in  the  arm  of  a  blacksmith,  to 
get  bigger  and  stronger  with  use. 


Well  done,  good  and  faithful 
se/bant  {Matt,  25  :  23). 

THE  approbation  of  those  we  love  and  re- 
A  spect  is  the  most  substantial  reward  of 
life.  It  is  better  than  possession  of  the  treas- 
ures we  accumulate  or  the  influence  we  ac- 
quire. The  smile  on  the  lips  of  mother,  sister, 
or  wife  ;  the  hand-shake  of  father,  brother, 
friend  ;  the  spoken  or  unspoken  "  well  done,1' 
— what  can  be  sweeter  than  this  ?  Wait  ! 
Perhaps  consciousness  of  the  ability  to  do  it 
again  is  the  best  of  all.  It  is  not  the  talents, 
but  the  power  to  gain  more,  that  is  the  noblest 
fruit  of  life's  endeavor.  Is  it  not  worth  the 
struggle  ?  To  know  that  in  any  sphere  of  ex 
66 


istence  to  which  we  may  be  translated  we  have 
acquired  the  power  to  do  our  duty  ! 


cAs  the  Spirit  ga<ve  them  utterance  (Acts  2:4), 

\~\  7HAT  beautiful  words  must  those  have 
been,  thus  prompted  by  the  Spirit  !  I 
have  occasionally  heard  such,  coming  like  the 
richest  music,  lingering  upon  the  ear  in  soft- 
ened echoes,  returning  to  memory  long  after- 
wards like  the  murmur  of  a  distant  hymn.  Do 
not  believe  that  such  words  are  spoken  without 
some  hard  and  even  terrible  preparation. 
Nothing  comes  out  of  the  mouth  in  speech 
that  has  not  in  some  way  gone  in  by  hard  labor 
through  some  avenue  of  the  intelligence.  Such 
eloqent  speeches  as  those  disciples  made,  are 
not  " chucked"  into  the  mind  by  the  Spirit 
of  God  like  ready-made  cartridges  into  a 
Winchester  rifle  !  It  is  true  that  there  come 
great  inspirational  moments  when  thought 
flashes  from  the  lips  of  great  orators  in  lan- 
guage that  surprises  even  themselves,  but 
those  thoughts  were  distilled  in  solemn  hours 
when  they  burned  the  midnight  oil,  or  trod 
the  wine-press  alone  in  some  great  and  illu- 
minating experience.  When  I  was  a  college 
boy,  I  used  to  wonder  why  I  could  not  de- 
bate as  well  as  the  other  fellows.      I  found 

67 


out  at  last  that,  while  I  was  playing  ball, 
they  were  ransacking  the  library  !  What 
came  out  of  these  men  at  Pentecost  had,  in 
my  firm  belief,  been  put  into  them  in  those 
long  days  of  humble  study  when  they  "com- 
panied  with  Jesus ' '  in  his  hard  travail. 


Only  be  strong  and  very 
courageous  {Josh,  1:7), 

''THE  hardest  task  I  ever  tackle  is  trying  to 
*  be  brave  when  I'm  scared.  It's  a  good 
deal  like  trying  to  be  hot  when  you're  cold. 
But  even  that  is  not  impossible.  There  are 
a  great  many  ways  to  get  hot  when  you  are 
cold.  You  can  kindle  a  fire,  and,  if  there 
isn't  any  wood,  you  can  run.  And  if  you  are 
too  stiff  to  run,  you  may  be  able  to  find  some- 
body to  thump  you  on  the  back,  and  keep  your 
blood  going  that  way.  And  it  is  the  same 
with  people  who  are  scared.  There  are  a 
thousand  ways  to  get  your  heart  back.  And 
the  best  one  I  know  is  to  "turn  not  to  the 
right  hand  nor  the  left."  In  the  vast  majority 
of  cases  people  are  scared  because  they  either 
know  or  suspect  they  are  in  the  wrong.  Get 
right.  Get  back  into  the  "way,"  and  your 
•'  grit  "  will  return.  Courage  is  the  assurance 
ot  divine  approval. 

68 


'But  their  eyes  *b>ere  holden  that  they 
should  not  kno%  him  (Luke  24  :  t6). 

IV]  OT   "holden"  by  any  outside  pressure. 

*  All  spiritually  blinded  eyes  are  ' '  holden ' ' 
from  the  inside.  It  is  not  surgical  operation 
and  magnifying  glasses  that  improve  the  vision 
of  the  soul.  It  is  the  steady  and  persistent 
use  of  the  inner  eye  itself.  If  you  should  stand 
for  twenty  years  trying  to  see  through  a  two- 
inch  plank,  you  could  not  do  it.  The  eye  in 
all  that  time  would  not  add  a  fraction  of  a  de- 
gree to  its  penetrating  power.  But,  so  far  as 
I  know,  there  is  not  a  spiritual  mystery  pre- 
sented to  the  soul  into  which  it  cannot  pene- 
trate farther  at  the  second  glance  than  the 
first.  If  you  do  not  recognize  God  in  Christ 
to-day,  you  may  to-morrow,  by  fixing  your 
gaze  steadily  upon  him. 

Sk 

Saul  laid  waste  the  church  [Ads  8  :  3), 

I_J  OW  easy  it  is  to  tear  down  the  work  that 
others  have  patiently  done  !  In  every 
great  city  there  are  professional  "wreckers." 
The  builder  begins  at  the  bottom;  the  wreckers 
begin  at  the  top.  He  builds  up,  they  pull 
down.  How  easy  it  is  to  be  a  destroyer  : 
Dynamite  is  the  only  instrument,  anarchy  the 
only  motive,  needed.  I  do  not  say  that  there 
69 


are  no  structures  erected  by  human  society 
that  ought  not  to  come  down.  It  requires  a 
very  noble  courage,  sometimes,  to  "  lay  waste  " 
the  works  of  those  who  have  gone  before  us. 
But  it  is  the  most  solemn,  serious,  dangerous 
business  in  the  world.  I'll  give  you  the  best 
rule  there  is  :  Never  destroy  a  hope,  or  a  cus- 
tom, or  an  institution,  of  human  life,  until  you 
have  a  better  thing  to  put  in  its  place.  Don't 
stop  people's  making  candles  until  you  give 
them  petroleum.  Don' t  smash  their  kerosene- 
oil  lamps  until  you  get  their  gas-pipes  laid. 
Don't  tear  out  their  gas-pipes  until  you  have 
strung  their  electric  wires. 


cAnd  Jehovah  hearkened  to  the  voice 
of  Israel  (Num.  21  :  3). 

\17E  CANNOT  say  that  God  accepts  every 
*  *  foolish  challenge,  or  takes  every  man 
at  his  lightest  word,  but  he  may  be  counted  on 
as  being  most  awfully  faithful  to  people  who 
put  him  to  these  solemn  tests.  If  you  are  in 
desperate  earnest,  if  you  mean  what  you  say,  if 
you  are  prepared  to  stand  by  it  at  all  cost,  then 
try  him.  There  is  some  principle  in  nature  (I 
prefer  to  say  in  the  heart  of  God)  that  accepts 
the  challenge  of  a  man  who  pledges  his  life  to 
virtue  and  usefulness  on  condition  that  God 
70 


will  fit  him  for  them.  If  you  don't  believe  it, 
try  it.  It  comes  pretty  close  to  being  a  law  of 
life  that  God  gives  us  cities  as  fast  as  we  are 
able  to  rule  them  wisely,  and  talents  as  fast  as 
we  are  able  to  use  them  profitably. 


<As  I  <was  'with  Moses,  so  I  ewitt 
be  <with  thee  (Josh,  1:5). 

'""THERE  lies  one  of  the  most  tremendous  in- 
spirations  of  life.  No  man  has  to  per- 
form any  painful  task  or  travel  any  lonely  way 
as  an  absolute  "novitiate."  Some  one  has 
always  gone  before  him.  He  may,  if  he  will, 
see  indubitable  proof  that  God  will  care  for 
him  in  the  fact  that  he  has  been  with  his  pre- 
decessors. Does  your  experience  in  life  seem 
perfectly  unique  ?  You  are  mistaken.  Mil- 
lions have  traveled  the  same  road  before,  and 
God  has  been  with  them.  When  Columbus 
put  out  on  the  limitless  ocean,  from  whose 
distant  horizon  every  other  mariner  had  turned 
back  in  horror,  even  he  could  not  say  that  he 
was  alone  and  single  in  his  adventure.  Ten 
thousand  other  mariners  had  made  attempts 
as  daring,  in  one  way  or  another.  There  is 
no  experience  of  life  that  is  new.  Millions 
have  gone  through  what  you  are  having  to 
endure,  and  God  was  with  them.  Have  you 
7i 


lost  your  fortune  ?  Are  you  going  blind  ? 
Are  you  about  to  die  ?  Well,  good  friend, 
look  about  you.  See  the  trials  of  your  pre- 
decessors. God  was  with  them.  Why  not 
with  you? 

& 

cAnd  the  pillar  of  cloud  removed  from 
before  them,  and  stood  behind 
them  {Exod.  14  :  19). 

TN  ALL  the  imagery  and  symbolism  of 
human  life  nothing  has  ever  surpassed 
that  of  the  "pillar  of  cloud  and  fire."  The 
most  cultivated  imaginations  in  China,  Persia, 
India,  Egypt,  and  Greece,  fell  short  of  this  sub- 
lime conception.  Some  of  the  readers  of  this 
marvelous  story  may  doubt,  or  even  disbelieve, 
that  there  was  an  actual  mist  of  fire  or  dew 
thus  shifting  about  these  wandering  slaves. 
Well,  beware,  good  friend,  of  losing  the 
majesty,  beauty,  and  import  of  this  immortal 
symbol.  Do  not  let  your  incredulity  or  skep- 
ticism blind  you  to  a  conception  of  life  sub- 
lime beyond  exaggeration.  There  was  never 
yet  man  or  nation  born  into  this  world  who 
was  not  accompanied  and  guarded  thus  mys- 
teriously. Through  all  these  glad,  sad,  sev- 
enty years,  something  (we  may  not  know 
exactly  what)  goes  shiningly  before  us  in  the 
darkness,  and  pilots  us  on  our  way.  And 
72 


when  the  day  dawns  it  retires  behind  us,  and 
stands  between  us  and  our  adversaries. 
Whether  you  call  it  God  or  nature,  there  it 
is.  You  may  refuse  to  see  it  or  to  believe  in 
it.  No  matter ;  it  never  leaves  you.  While 
you  live,  this  invisible  light  leads  you,  this  in- 
visible cloud  defends  you.  Nothing  can  de- 
stroy you  until  the  time  appointed.  Now, 
who  cannot  see  that  the  difference  in  the 
spiritual  lives  of  men  lies  in  the  perceiving,  or 
not  perceiving,  these  sublime  ministrations? 
The  man  who  is  blind  to  them  is  nevertheless 
attended  by  them,  but  stumbles  wretchedly 
along  his  way.  The  man  who  is  alive  to 
them,  and  through  such  marvelous  imagery 
and  symbolism  brings  them  within  the  range 
of  his  vision,  travels  onward  with  song  and 
gladness. 

I  die;  but  God  %itt  surely 
<visit  you  {Gen.  50  :  24). 

"THERE  you  have  the  ultimate  consolation 
of  all  reformers  and  philanthropists. 
Men  think  of  themselves  (and  others  think  of 
them)  that  the  objects  of  compassion  who  lean 
upon  them  for  support,  or  the  institutions 
which  stand  in  their  benefactions,  cannot  get 
along  without  them.  No  j  men  die,  but  God 
abides.  Props  fall  out  from  under  buildings, 
73 


and  piers  from  bridges,  but  gravity  never  loses 
its  energy.  It  is  gravity,  and  not  props  or  piers, 
that  does  the  business.  It  is  God,  and  not 
individuals,  or  even  institutions,  that  keeps 
human  society  in  order.  The  greatest  Joseph 
or  Washington  or  Lincoln  is  only  a  medium 
through  which  the  divine  power  operates. 
They  die,  but  God  continues  his  ceaseless 
ministrations.  The  nurses  depart,  the  Great 
Physician  continues  his  visits. 


cAnd  suddenly  there  came  from 
heaven  {Acts  2:2), 

O  UDDEN  things  seem  disconnected  and  iso- 
^  lated,  but  they  are  not.  They  are  the 
results  of  long  trains  of  antecedent  circum- 
stances. It  only  takes  a  second  for  the  light- 
ning to  flash,  but  think  how  long  it  has  taken 
to  gather.  The  French  Revolution  seemed  to 
boil  over  in  an  instant,  but  it  had  been  seeth- 
ing for  centuries.  This  outburst  of  the  divine 
life,  of  the  Holy  Spirit,  had  been  preceded  by 
ages  of  toil  and  suffering  of  the  heroes  and 
martyrs  of  Israel,  by  the-  life  and  death  of 
Jesus,  by  the  silent  brooding  of  the  spirits  in 
the  hearts  of  men.  There  have  to  be  ages  of 
splitting  and  drying  and  laying  the  kindling- 
wood.  Then  comes  the  fire — suddenly.  It 
74 


would  be  more  pleasant  to  live  when  the  fire 
of  a  revival  bursts  forth,  but  perhaps  more 
useful  to  live  when  its  materials  are  being  gath- 
ered. 

cAll  the  house  of  Israel  lamented 
after  Jehovah  (/  Sam,  7:2), 

r"FHIS  fact  discloses  a  law.  It  is  a  principle 
of  mortal  life  that,  however  well  humanity 
has  gotten  along  without  God,  for  a  time, 
it  sooner  or  later  turns  toward  him  with  con- 
scious need  and  passionate  desire.  This  feel- 
ing first  manifests  itself  in  vague  and  inarticu- 
late longings,  then  in  bitter  lamentations. 
Vegetation  may  endure  a  few  days  without 
sunlight,  but  not  forever,  and  its  need  is  re- 
vealed in  drooping  leaves  and  withering  stalks. 
The  dependence  of  the  souls  of  men  on  God 
is  no  less  vital.  It  is  no  less  vital  than  that  of 
little  children  on  their  parents,  who,  if  left 
in  their  nurseries,  may  play  contentedly 
for  a  few  moments.  Then  comes  that  first 
uneasy  flash  of  consciousness  that  they  are 
alone  ;  then  the  timidity  ;  then  the  fear  ;  then 
the  agony  ;  then  the  loud  outcry.  It  is  this 
same  emotional  experience  through  which  we 
"  grown-ups"  must  pass  when  we  discover 
that  we  too  are  playing  alone  in  God's  great 
universe. 

75 


Whither  thou  goest,  1 -will  go  {Ruth  I  :  16). 

JDERHAPS,  if  it  were  possible  to  see  through 
what  self-denial  a  genuine  friendship 
must  lead  us,  none  would  ever  be  formed. 
Few  of  us  can  tolerate  the  logic  of  love,  which 
is,  "Where  thou  goest,  lodgest,  sufferest, 
diest,  I  will  be  as  near  thee  as  thy  shadow." 
To  secure  and  bestow  such  friendship  is  to 
fulfil  the  highest  function  of  life.  Do  you 
want  such  a  friend  ?  Make  yourself  necessary 
to  somebody.  As  sure  as  there  must  be  foot- 
holds or  trellises  or  bark  on  trees  for  climbing 
plants  and  vines,  there  must  be  something  in 
you  for  friendship  to  attach  itself  to.  Love 
can  live  upon  itself  alone,  but  friendship  must 
feed  on  worthiness.  Therefore,  the  way  to 
secure  a  friend  is  to  be  one.  "He  that  hath 
friends  must  show  himself  friendly. M  "  A  true 
friend  is  one  soul  in  two  bodies, ' '  said  Aristotle. 


He  thai  is  but  little  in  the  kingdom  of  Goa 
is  greater  than  he  {Luke  7  :  28), 

A  FTER  all,  it  is  not  great  talents,  great  in- 
^^  tellect,  great  power,  great  genius,  that 
God  most  loves.  It  is  those  gentle  and  noble 
characteristics  inspired  by  a  sense  of  duty  to 
men  and  to  God.  Many  a  servant  in  a  palace 
has   been    greater    than    the    king    upon    his 

76 


throne,  many  a  soldier  in  the  ranks  greater 
than  the  general  on  his  horse.  Many  a  pupil 
trembling  under  the  eye  of  the  great  professor 
has  been  finer,  nobler,  grander,  than  his  in- 
structor. Specific  gravity  varies  with  the  ele- 
ments. Some  things  that  are  very  heavy  in 
air  are  very  light  in  water.  Some  things  that 
are  very  small  on  earth  are  very  large  in 
heaven. 

A 

He  that  overcometh  shall  inherit 
these  things  (Re<v.  21  :  7), 

'"THE  conquering  life, — let  us  live  it.  There 
are  no  absolutely  insuperable  obstacles 
along  the  pathway.  If  there  are  chasms,  there 
is  also  a  way  to  bridge  them.  If  there  are 
lions,  there  is  also  a  way  to  slay  them.  Is  there 
a  mountain  ?  Well,  when  God  puts  a  moun- 
tain in  your  path,  it  is  an  intimation  that  there 
is  a  place  for  you  on  its  summit.  It  is  safe  to 
say  that  the  great  masses  of  mankind  go  down 
to  the  grave  with  a  consciousness  of  defeat. 
They  have  been  thwarted  in  their  plans, 
deceived  in  others  and  in  themselves.  For 
this  there  are  two  reasons  :  In  the  first  place, 
they  have  struggled  for  impossible  ends, — 
like  gaining  happiness  through  wrong-doing. 
In  the  second  place,  they  do  not  appreciate 
that  certain  kinds  of  failure  are  the  most  sub- 
77 


lime  successes.  Christ  failed,  judged  from 
their  view-point.  The  life  of  a  man  who 
keeps  pure  and  sweet  and  hopeful  is  a  mag- 
nificent success,  and  ought  to  fill  him  with 
irrepressible  joy,  even  though  he  dies  in  the 
poorhouse. 

<Pea.ce  be  unto  you  {John  20  :  19)* 

HPHE  whole  longing  of  our  Lord's  life  may 
*  be  almost  summed  up  in  those  words. 
Always  and  everywhere  he  was  impelled  by  a 
ceaseless  desire  to  bring  peace  to  harassed 
men,  peace  between  nations,  peace  between 
neighbors,  peace  in  the  soul  itself.  That  was 
his  passion.  "O  troubled  hearts,  receive  this 
gift  of  peace  ! ' '  What  a  passion  !  How  wide 
the  contrast  to  ours  !  And  how  pathetic  that 
a  man  so  full  of  peace,  so  eager  to  bestow  it 
upon  others,  should  have  been  the  wholly  in- 
nocent cause  of  so  much  strife  !  It  was  not. 
his  fault.  It  is  not  the  fault  of  the  sun  that 
dead  bodies  decay  at  the  touch  of  its  beams. 
Nor  is  it  the  fault  of  love  that  its  presence 
arouses  and  maddens  the  hearts  of  the  wicked. 
But  the  longing  of  Christ  will  yet  be  satisfied. 
His  love  will  conquer.  Peace  will  be  the  uni- 
versal condition  of  existence.  Calm  confi- 
dence, unbroken  repose  of  mind. — this  is  the 

78 


ultimate  attainment  of  human   life  in  its  di- 
vinely guided  struggles  upward. 


Whose  heart  the  Lord  opened  (Acts  16  :  14). 

TT'S  wonderful  to  see  God  open  a  human 
*  heart.  There  is  no  other  power  that  can 
do  it.  See  the  rain  open  a  bud,  the  frost  open 
a  burr,  a  locksmith  open  a  safe.  Outside 
pressure  has  to  be  brought  to  bear  on  closed 
hearts,  and  so  God  comes  with  the  frost  of 
sorrow,  the  dew  of  a  new  joy,  or  he  winds  his 
way  through  the  intricacies  of  the  wards  of  the 
lock  by  an  argument,  or  an  epigram,  or  a  pang 
of  conscience.  One  after  another  yields  as  he 
stands  there  knocking.  His  providence  and 
grace  are  mighty  hammers.  They  sometimes 
shatter  the  hardest  hearts,  and  sometimes  melt 
them. 

c4nd  the  children  of  Israel  set 
forward  (Num.  10  :  12). 

"CET  forward!"  Keep  that  motto  in 
^  mind.  All  true  progress  is  onward 
and  upward.  If  you  are  on  the  wrong  track, 
don't  'May  down! "  Turn  squarely  round,  and 
get  out  headforemost.  Nulla  vestigia  retrorsa, 
— that  is,  "Never  a  step  backward."  Don't 
79 


get  into  the  wrong  road.  Stop  and  look  for 
the  signs ;  ask  questions.  Make  a  little  sure 
progress  every  day.  "  Get  a  move  on  you." 
"Keep  making  headway."  What  did  you 
accomplish  last  year?  Nothing?  That's 
awful  !  "  Get  ahead  ; ' '  put  a  little  money  in 
the  bank  j  add  another  friend  to  your  list ; 
earn  a  "raise"  in  your  salary;  conquer  an- 
other bad  habit  ;  acquire  another  virtue  ;  set 
up  a  tall  stake  to  mark  your  last  year's  accom- 
plishment, and  don't  rest  a  minute  until  you 
1 *  go  it  one  better. ' ' 


Forgive  {Gen*  50  :  17). 

T^HOSE  mental  processes  by  which  "  for- 
giveness"  is  formed  in  the  soul  are  the 
most  beautiful  in  the  world.  What  instinctive 
admiration  we  have  for  a  soul  that  manu- 
factures forgiveness  !  It  is  wonderful  to  go 
into  a  mill,  and  see  them  take  old  dirty  rags, 
wash  them,  chop  them  up,  soak  them  to  a 
pulp,  and  then  roll  them  out  into  great  sheets 
of  snow-white  paper.  It  is  wonderful  to  see  a 
great  river  receive  the  turbid  waters  of  drains 
and  sewers,  roll  them  about,  tumble  them  to- 
gether, throw  them  up  to  air  and  sunlight,  and, 
fifty  miles  after  they  have  carried  them  past 
one  great  city,  give  them  to  another  clear  as 

So 


crystal  and  fit  to  drink.  But  this  is  nothing 
compared  to  seeing  minds  like  those  of  Joseph 
and  Jesus  receive  into  themselves  curses,  in- 
justice, insult,  evil,  and  by  that  marvelous 
alchemy  of  love  give  them  out  in  the  form  of 
kindness,  sympathy,  and  forgiveness.  I  know 
such  hearts.  It  makes  no  difference  what  you 
throw  in  to  their  wheels,  nothing  comes  out 
but  gentleness. 

& 

Cleanse  your  conscience  {Heb.  9  :  14), 

HPO  THAT  great  business  Jesus  gave  his  life. 
*  Not  to  inventing  machinery  to  lighten 
labor,  not  to  discovering  laws  to  explain  the 
mysteries  of  nature,  not  to  devising  new  insti- 
tutions to  remodel  civil  government,  but  to 
cleansing  consciences,  to  teaching  men  how  to 
throw  off  the  burden  of  guilt,  how  to  live  at  peace 
with  themselves,  their  neighbors,  God.  This 
is  the  noblest  business  in  the  world.  There 
are  no  two  different  feelings  more  analogous 
than,  on  coming  in  from  toil  tired,  hot,  and 
dirty,  to  plunge  into  a  bath,  and  emerge 
rested,  cool,  and  clean  j  and,  going  to  God 
with  the  heart  full  of  filthy  and  wicked 
thoughts,  and  rising  from  the  knees  penitent, 
forgiven,  restored  to  terms  of  confidence  and 
love.  To  be  a  teacher  of  that  art, — is  it  not 
sublime  ? 

81 


Let  us  return  into  Egypt  {Num.  14  :  4). 

\17HAT  ?  Back  to  slavery?  Never  !  It  is 
*  Y  better  to  die  with  one's  feet  on  the  soil 
of  liberty,  and  have  for  one's  last  breath  the 
sweet  air  of  freedom.  When  the  Spanish  mes- 
sengers found  Pizarro  and  his  companions  half 
starved  and  sick,  and  commanded  them  to 
abandon  their  foolhardy  expedition  to  Peru, 
the  old  adventurer  drew  a  line  in  the  sand 
with  the  point  of  his  sword,  and  told  the  cow- 
ards to  return,  but  bade  every  hero  to  cross  it 
with  him.  They  crossed  to  a  man.  If  you 
have  started  out  to  live  the  "divine"  life, — 
the  life  of  purity,  of  peace,  of  unselfishness, — 
don' t  turn  back,  though  death  and  hell  should 
seem  to  stand  in  your  way. 


cAnd  Jacob's  toetl  was  there  {John  4:6). 

1Y[  O  OBJECT  in  nature  is  more  beautiful  or 
more  useful  than  a  water  source.  To 
dig  a  well,  to  open  a  path  to  a  spring,  to  pipe 
a  stream  to  a  fountain, — these  are  among  the 
most  noble  deeds  of  human  life.  Some  people 
are  like  wells,  and  have  much  in  them  that  is 
useful  to  their  fellows,  but  it  can  only  be  got- 
ten at  with  a  long  rope  like  that  at  Jacob's 
well.  Some  are  like  those  water-soaked  fields 
82 


on  Western  prairies,  where  the  horses  find 
drink  by  stamping  with  their  hard  hoofs. 
Some  are  like  generous  springs  with  water 
trickling  quietly  over  their  green  lips.  Some 
are  like  great  copious  fountains  flinging  the 
sparkling  flood  high  into  air.  Some  are  as 
dry  as  an  abandoned  well  in  Texas,  down 
into  which  I  once  let  a  bucket  with  a  rope  one 
hundred  feet  long,  only  to  dip  up  mud  !  What- 
ever else  you  are,  don't  be  a  dry  well  ! 


c4nd  they  could  not  answer  again 
unto  these  things  {Luke  14  :  6), 

"THERE  are  two  unanswerable  arguments, — 
absolute  truthfulness  of  word  and  abso- 
lute beauty  of  deed.  Men  abuse  us,  condemn 
us,  suspect  us,  defy  us,  but  there  is  something 
about  a  truth  told  with  eyes  wide  open,  and  a 
beautiful  deed  done  with  a  heart  full  of  love, 
that  silences  and  convicts.  Your  enemies  may 
rage  and  froth  at  the  mouth,  they  may  burn 
you  at  the  stake  or  hang  you  on  a  gibbet,  but 
their  words  of  condemnation  die  in  their 
throats.  Truth  and  goodness — these  were  the 
weapons  with  which  Christ  won  his  victories. 
And  they  are  as  mighty  to-day  as  ever.  Recall 
the  calm  assurance  and  the  exalted  happiness 
that  came  to  you  when  you  stood  up  fearlessly 

83 


and  told  the  truth,  or  courageously  and  did  the 
right,  and  then  acknowledge  to  yourself  that 
"a  boy  is  a  fool  who  ever  hesitates  an  instant." 

& 

God  is  no  respecter  of  persons  {Acts  10  :  34), 
DEFORE  what  earthly  tribunal  do  men 
*-*  stand  solely  on  their  merits  ?  In  the  judg- 
ment of  what  individual  do  the  mere  accesso- 
ries of  life,  the  superficial  elements,  count  for 
nothing  ?  In  spite  of  ourselves,  we  base  our 
estimate  of  character  on  wealth,  money,  cul- 
ture, manners,  dress  !  Ninety-nine  out  every 
hundred  of  us  give  ' '  the  benefit  of  the  doubt ' ' 
to  a  woman  in  a  tailor-made  suit  or  a  man  in  a 
"swallow-tail"  coat.  Who  does  not  blush 
at  the  superficiality,  the  partiality,  of  his  own 
judgment  of  men?  Who  would  not  be  glad 
to  live  in  a  social  circle  or  do  business  in  a 
community  where  nothing  but  intrinsic  worth 
counted  ?  Fancy  the  thrill  that  would  shoot 
through  the  hearts  of  honest  laboring  men, 
who  have  all  their  lives  seen  people  shrink 
away  from  their  dirty  clothes  and  calloused 
hands,  when  they  felt  that  at  last  their  neigh- 
bors had  taken  them  at  their  true  worth,  and 
that  they  were  now  standing  on  the  simple 
platform  of  manhood  !  Your  day  is  coming, 
my  dear  fellow,  and  it  will  be  when  you  stand 
before  God.  He  is  no  respecter  of  persons. 
84 


cAstonished  at  his  teaching  {Mark  I  :  22), 

rx$  COURSE,  they  were,  and  still  are,  at 
^^  the  teaching  of  any  man  who  goes 
straight  to  the  heart  of  things  as  he  did.  For 
he  was  as  direct  in  his  teachings  as  in  his  do- 
ings. Jesus  was  always  looking  for  the  ' '  heart ' ' 
of  the  thing.  His  mind  went  straight  to  the 
mark.  He  swept  away  all  the  mists  in  an  in- 
stant, and  made  his  hearers  see  just  what  he 
saw.  Now  and  then  we  meet  a  man  who  talks 
about  things  so  simply  that  we  say,  "  Why  in 
the  world  didn't  I  say  that  myself?  It  lay  on 
the  very  surface,  and  yet  I  overlooked  it." 
Benjamin  Franklin  and  Abraham  Lincoln  had 
a  way  of  thus  seeing  and  saying  what  every 
one  else  overlooked  in  the  realm  of  scientific 
and  practical  affairs.  Some  men  are  gifted 
with  this  power  at  birth,  but  any  one  can  ac- 
quire something  of  it  if  he  will  only  believe 
that  the  "heart"  of  the  subject  is  the  thing 
to  look  for. 

Hofwbeit  the  people  that  dwelt  in  the 
land  are  strong  (Nurtu  13  :  28). 

r\F  COURSE!  Was  it  ever  otherwise? 
^-^  All  great  prizes  are  at  the  top,  and  not 
the  bottom,  of  the  ladder ;  behind  barred 
doors,  not  open  ones.  The  children  of  Anak 
g;  ard  every  treasure  worth  the  love  of  man. 
85 


Take  the  pearl,  which  lies  at  the  bottom  of  the 
sea.  Take  liberty,  which  is  not  a  donation, 
but  an  achievement ;  not  granted  by  an  easy 
vote  of  a  legislature,  but  attained  by  infinite 
toil  and  suffering.  Take  God,  who  conceals 
himself  beyond  the  discovery  of  every  eye  but 
the  one  which  will  not  take  ''No"  for  an 
answer.  "  Raise  the  stone  and  there  thou 
shalt  find  me,  cleave  the  wood  and  there  am 
I."  Lift!  Cleave!  "I  will  make  the  sal- 
vation of  my  soul  my  life  work,"  said  Jona- 
than Edwards.  I  say  this  :  An  easy  life  is 
always  a  bad  one.  A  Canaan  without  con- 
quest is  (ninety-nine  times  out  of  a  hundred) 
either  a  curse  or  a  calamity. 


Go  ♦  ♦  ♦  tett  John  the  things  which  ye 
have  seen  and  heard  {Luke  7  :  22), 

"THE  fishes  leave  no  trail  in  the  sea,  and  the 
*  birds  leave  no  trail  in  the  air,  but  every 
living  thing  that  creeps  or  crawls  or  runs  across 
the  surface  of  the  earth  leaves  the  marks  of  its 
passage  behind  it.  The  lion  leaves  his  foot- 
prints and  the  carcasses  of  his  victims.  The 
snail  leaves  a  slimy  wake,  and,  if  our  eyes  were 
sharp  enough,  we  could  see  the  marks  of  the 
feet  of  the  crickets  and  the  grasshoppers.  And 
60  men  leave  their  marks, — the  conqueror  in 
86 


desolated  provinces,  the  statesmen  in  benefi- 
cent laws,  the  artist  in  great  pictures,  the  archi- 
tect in  noble  buildings.  The  marks  which 
Jesus  left  behind  him  were  happy  homes  and 
hearts.  You  could  trace  him  from  Nazareth 
to  Jerusalem,  and  from  Jerusalem  to  Caper- 
naum, by  the  people  whom  he  had  healed  of 
their  diseases  and  lifted  out  of  their  sins. 
These  trails  cannot  be  covered  up.  What  are 
you  leaving  behind  you? 


Is  less  than  all  seeds ;  but .  ♦  ♦  becometh 
a  tree  (Matt.  13  :  32). 

1VIEVER,  never,  never  despise  a  thing  be- 
cause it  is  small.  I  can  still  remember 
the  vague  feeling  of  wonder  in  my  heart  when, 
as  a  child,  I  said  over  those  little  old-fashioned 
lines  : 

■ '  Little  drops  of  water,  little  grains  of  sand, 
Make  the  mighty  ocean  and  the  pleasant  land." 

It  always  seemed  to  me  that  it  ought  to  have 
been  just  the  reverse.  I  know  better  now,  and  I 
take  off  my  hat  to  all  little  bits  of  things, — 
little  brooks,  little  eggs,  little  microbes,  little 
boys,  and  little  girls,  not  because  they  are 
little,  but  because  of  what  is  tucked  away  out 
of  sight  in  their  littleness.  When  some  one 
87 


disparaged  a  boy  because  he  was  little,  Daniel 
Webster  said,  "It  is  out  of  just  such  things 
that  men  are  made."  The  littlest,  puniest 
child  in  that  class  of  yours  may  some  time  sit 
in  a  presidential  chair  or  judge  angels.  Be 
careful  how  you  treat  him. 


cAnd  hawing  given  thanks  {John  6  :  If). 

CVEN  if  gratitude  were  not  a  duty,  we  should 
still  try  to  cultivate  it,  just  for  the  pleas- 
ure it  excites  in  the  soul.  The  sensations  which 
we  feel  when  gratitude  wells  from  the  heart 
are  almost  perfect  bliss.  They  are  what  a 
rose  would  feel  if  it  were  conscious  of  its  own 
perfume,  or  a  spring  of  the  pure  water  gurgling 
up  out  of  its  depths.  To  me  ingratitude  is 
repulsive  and  horrible.  Did  you  ever  watch 
the  keepers  feed  the  tigers  in  a  museum  ?  It 
is  the  absence  of  gratitude  that  makes  the 
sight  horrible.  All  the  eye  of  the  tiger  says  is 
"More,  more,  morel"  And  I  have  seen 
men  eat  in  the  same  way.  How  much  better 
than  an  animal  is  the  man  who  does  not  feel 
gratitude  for  his  daily  bread  and  all  his  other 
mercies  !  How  different  is  the  light  in  the 
eye  of  a  tiger  from  that  in  the  eye  of  a  sick 
soldier  when  a  Sister  of  Charity  gives  him  a 
draught  of  cold  water  !  That  light  is  gratitude, 
88 


a  light  more  beautiful  than  that  of  the  evening 
star.      Are  you  cultivating  it  in  yourself? 


^member  the  sabbath  day,  to 
keep  it  holy  (Exod.  20  :  8). 

V^OU  can  judge  a  man's  intellectual,  moral, 
*■  and  spiritual  attainments  by  the  use  he 
makes  of  his  Sabbaths.  If  they  bore  him,  it  is 
as  certain  that  he  has  not  achieved  true  cul- 
ture, as  it  is  if  he  is  bored  by  literature  and  art. 
If  he  devotes  them  to  idleness  or  pleasure,  it 
is  like  letting  a  pianola  stand  closed,  or  using 
it  to  play  rag-time  music.  I  should  be  more 
ashamed  not  to  know  how  to  make  my  Sabbath 
days  a  supreme  joy  and  blessing  than  not  to 
know  how  to  spend  a  thousand  dollars  to  my 
own  advantage.  Men  need  to  bathe  their 
souls  in  Sabbath  peace  and  quiet  as  they  need 
to  bathe  their  bodies  in  pure  water.  It  takes 
time  to  be  holy.  Men  can  no  more  be  holy 
without  quiet  hours  of  exposing  themselves  to 
the  influence  of  the  divine  Spirit  than  an  apple 
can  get  mellow  without  weeks  of  hanging  in 
the  sun.  You  may  be  able  to  keep  honest 
and  industrious  and  faithful  by  being  ever- 
lastingly on  the  hop,  skip,  and  jump,  but  holy 
(calm,  serene,  tranquil,  at  rest  in  moral  equi- 
librium) you  will  never  be  without  your  hours 

89 


and  days  of  meditation  and  worship.  Men  are 
not  polished  into  holiness  by  being  eternally 
rolled  along  the  shore  of  the  ocean  of  life,  like 
pebbles.  Don't  try  to  keep  Sunday  holy,  but 
your  self. 

He  that  Icveth  his  neighbor  hath 
fulfilled  the  lam  {Rom.  13  :  10). 

V/'ES,  love  is  a  "short  cut"  to  the  goal  of 
duty.  Do  you  want  to  be  happy  ? 
Learn  how  to  love.  Do  you  want  to  meet 
every  obligation  of  life  ?  Learn  how  to  love. 
Everything  goes  easy  to  the  lover.  From 
what  mysterious  herb  hath  God  extracted  this 
strange  potency  by  which  pain  is  made  pleasure, 
and  the  most  disagreeable  drudgery  of  life  a  lux- 
ury ?  If  you  never  learn  any  other  lesson,  learn 
how  to  love.  This  is  not  so  easy.  It  is  easy 
enough  to  love  what  you  do  love,  but  how  are 
you  going  to  love  what  you  don't  love?  Ay, 
there's  the  rub  !  What  !  love  disagreeable, 
offensive,  unlovely  people  ?  To  be  sure  ! 
There  is  certain  to  be  something  good  and 
sweet  in  the  worst  of  them.  And  besides 
there  is  that  strange  and  wonderful  love  of 
"benevolence" — the  power  of  the  soul  to 
wish  the  worst  people  well,  which,  if  it  is 
aroused,  develops  into  a  love  as  pure  as  the 
love  of  God.  It's  hard  to  get  it  started,  but 
90 


the  capacity  is  in  you,  so  rouse  it  up  !  When 
you  can  control  your  affections,  and  love  whom 
you  ought  to  love,  that  strangely  beautiful  and 
wonderful  feeling  will  fulfil  all  the  duties  of  life, 
as  electricity  seems  likely  to  do  all  the  work  of 
the  world.  Yes,  love  is  the  "short  cut"  to 
the  goal  of  duty. 

cAnd  he  could  not  be  hid  {Mark  7  :  24), 

^ENIUSof  any  kind  is  like  fire.  Amidst 
^^  the  combustible  elements  of  human  life 
it  will  burn  itself  out  into  view.  There  will  be 
many  a  young  fellow  who  will  need  to  be  told 
this,  for  there  are  thousands  of  them  who  are 
already  getting  embittered  at  the  lack  of 
"recognition."  I  do  not  say  that  merely 
potential  genius — genius  which  exists  latent 
— will  always  be  discovered  ;  but  I  do  say 
that  genius  which  is  alive,  active,  efficient, 
actually  accomplishing  things  for  the  enjoy- 
ment or  betterment  of  mankind,  can  no  more 
be  concealed  than  fire.  The  world  will  not 
dig  you  out  of  your  hole,  as  boys  dig  out  wood- 
chucks,  if  you  merely  have  the  undeveloped 
capacity  to  do  things.  But  if  you  are  actually 
singing  a  song,  or  writing  a  poem,  or  preach- 
ing a  sermon,  or  building  a  house,  or  paint- 
ing a  picture,  or  shoeing  a  horse,  in  such  a 
way  as  to  give  pleasure  or  profit  to  men,  they 

91 


will  find  you,  even  if  you  are  down  in  a  well. 
If  you  do  not  get  recognition,  ten  chances  to 
one  it  is  because  you  don't  play  your  part  to 
the  satisfaction  of  the  audience. 


He  teadeth  me  beside  still  waters  {Psa.  23  :2). 

'T'HE  soul  of  man,  in  one  respect  at  least, 
shares  the  twofold  necessity  of  water, — 
agitation  and  repose.  There  are  times  when 
we  need  to  be  shaken  up  by  the  fury  of  the 
rapids,  and  others  when  we  need  to  be  spread 
out  in  the  calm  stillness  of  the  lake.  To  the 
young,  all  repose  is  stagnation.  They  love  to 
launch  their  barks  on  stormy  seas.  But  there 
comes  a  time  when  the  soul  longs  for  still 
waters — '■' waters  of  rest."  The  final  meas- 
urement of  life  values  discloses  the  ineffable 
worth  of  stillness  and  quiet.  There  is  no 
power  like  that  of  silence  and  repose.  The 
heart  that  is  to  be  filled  to  the  brim  with  holy 
joy  must  be  still.  Energy  resides  in  tranquil- 
lity. The  stars  and  the  sun  rise  in  silence, 
and  so  do  great  events.  Bees  work  in  silence, 
and  so  do  thoughts.  Trees  grow  in  aphony  and 
muteness,  so  also  do  characters.  But  rest  and 
peace  are  not  products  of  external  conditions. 
The  soul  may  be  tempest-tossed  on  the  most 
stagnant  sea,  and  yet  as  calm  as  heaven 
92 


even  amidst  the  breakers.  "  Diogenes  found 
more  rest  in  his  tub  than  Alexander  on  his 
throne."  "Weariness  can  snore  upon  the 
flint  when  rusty  sloth  finds  the  down  pillow 
hard."  All  true  peace  and  rest  and  quietness 
are  the  gifts  of  God  through  the  consciousness 
of  his  presence. 


A 


V 


He  <was  much  perplexed  (Mark  6  :20). 

"HERE  is  a  fearful  fascination  about  both 
evil  and  good.  We  are  drawn  towards 
both,  as  men  are  drawn  to  the  edges  of  preci- 
pices and  the  tops  of  mountains.  We  are 
pulled  both  ways  like  iron  filings  between  pow- 
erful magnets.  They  "  turn  our  heads. "  We 
are  "perplexed."  Herod  halted  and  hesi- 
tated between  John  and  his  boon  companions. 
When  Herodias  sang,  he  thought  there  was 
nothing  else  in  the  whole  world  worth  his 
while.  But  when  John  transfixed  him  with  his 
deep-set  eye,  and  thrilled  him  with  the  very 
eloquence  of  heaven,  it  seemed  to  him  as  if  he 
could  throw  away  his  scepter  and  his  crown 
without  a  struggle  to  adopt  the  beautiful  life 
that  he  described.  And  when  neither  of  them 
were  with  him,  when  he  was  all  alone,  when 
silence  brooded  around  him,  then  he  did  not 
know  what  to  do,  for  he  was  tormented  with  a 
93 


desire  for  both.  But  he  had  to  choose  at  last, 
and  so  do  we  all.  We  may  put  it  off  and  put 
it  off,  but  finally  we  shall  be  compelled  to  de- 
cide. You  cannot  always  halt  between  the 
two  sets  of  companions  who  are  trying  to  claim 
you  for  their  own.  One  of  them  will  get  you 
at  last.  You  had  better  decide  before  it  is 
decided  for  you  by  some  terrible  mistake  you 
stumble  into. 


This  is  of  a.  truth  the  prophet  thai  cometh 
into  the  world  {John  6  :  14), 

TT  CAME  out  at  last,— the  real  truth  about 
*  this  wonderful  being.  Be  sure  of  this, — 
the  secret  nature  of  every  one  of  us  will 
sooner  or  later  be  revealed.  Our  Lord's 
prophetic  gifts  ''revealed  themselves."  All 
real  talents  are  like  fire, — they  burn  out  into 
view.  If  you  have  a  gift,  do  not  be  afraid 
that  it  will  never  be  discovered.  Do  not  go 
around  thrusting  it  into  other  people's  faces. 
Do  not  be  bragging  of  it,  describing  it,  calling 
attention  to  it.  If  you  have  the  capacity  to 
stand  at  the  head  of  your  class,  or  run  the 
business  in  which  you  are  now  only  an  errand 
boy,  it  will  leak  out.  The  boss  or  the  super- 
intendent will  see  it  creeping  out  of  every  little 
deed  you  do. 

94 


They  toere  moved  'with 
indignation  (Matt.  21  :  15). 

VOU  can  judge  a  man  always  and  every- 
where by  what  angers  him.  What  is  it 
that  makes  you  maddest  ?  Is  it  injustice  ?  Is 
it  impurity  ?  Is  it  vice  of  any  kind  ?  That  is 
a  noble  feeling  that  flames  with  a  sudden  pas- 
sion at  any  meanness  and  at  any  wrong. 
But  these  men  (shame  upon  them!)  were 
angered  by  innocence,  by  the  recognition  of 
virtue,  by  the  triumph  of  holiness.  If  your 
heart  swells  with  bitterness  because  of  the 
prosperity  of  some  one  who  is  innocent  and 
good,  be  sure  that  it  is  the  abode  of  an  evil 
spirit,  and  needs  cleansing. 


He  that  loveth  his  life  loseth  it  [John  12  :  25). 

TF  YOU  get  strong,  and  then  try  to  keep 
your  strength  without  using  it,  you  will 
-find  that  every  muscle  grows  flabby,  soft,  and 
weak.  If  you  get  power,  and  try  to  keep  it 
without  exercising  it,  it  will  do  you  as  much 
good  as  steam  will  do  a  boiler  with  no  wheels 
to  turn.  If  you  get  money,  and  try  to  enjoy 
it  without  spending  it,  or  giving  it  away,  any 
pleasure  you  derive  from  it  will  make  you 
selfish,  mean,  and  low.  Nature  works  auto- 
matically in  this  field.  When  my  furnace  gets 
95 


too  hot,  a  damper  closes,  and  the  draft  shuts 
off.  Nature  operates  the  machinery  of  your 
heart  in  the  same  way.  If  you  get  a  certain 
amount  of  this  world's  goods,  and  do  not 
divide  with  others,  the  damper  closes,  the 
sensibility  to  happiness  ceases,  the  power  to 
enjoy  cools. 

If  thou  ivitt  indeed  deliver,  ♦  ♦  .  then  I 
will  utterly  destroy  (Num.  21 :  2). 

IT  IS  a  perilous  experiment  to  offer  condi- 
*  tions  to  God,  for  the  case  looks  so  differ- 
ent when  the  conditions  are  met  !  Many  a 
mother  has  promised  to  dedicate  a  baby  to 
God  (if  he  would  only  give  her  one)  who  has 
forgotten  the  promise  in  the  selfish  sweetness 
of  its  love.  Many  a  man  has  sworn  to  give 
his  fortune  to  benevolence  (if  God  would  per- 
mit him  to  make  it)  who,  when  he  has  ac- 
quired it,  could  not  resist  its  fascinations. 
Many  a  boy  has  vowed  himself  to  the  ministry 
(if  God  would  give  him  an  education)  who 
afterward  could  not  resist  the  temptation  to 
use  it  for  his  own  aggrandizement.  And  yet  a 
pledge  like  this  is  solemn  beyond  words. 
Have  you  sworn  ?  Fulfil  !  You  may  affirm 
that  circumstances  have  altered,  and  excuse 
yourself  in  a  thousand  ways.  The  solemn  fact 
remains  that  a  promise  made  to  the  invisible 

96 


God  has  a  million  fold  more  sacredness  than 
to  an  earthly  friend.  I'll  lose  my  guess  if 
these  words  do  not  fall  under  the  eye  of  some 
one  whose  life  has  been  perverted  or  thwarted 
by  failing  to  stick  to  a  pledge.  You  know 
how  true  they  are  ! 


Wherefore  didst  thou  doubt  ?  (Matt.  14  :  SI.) 

"  \17HEN  he  saw  the  wind  boisterous." 
"  ™  Well,  that  is  the  way  with  most  of 
us.  It  is  easy  to  be  brave  when  there  is  no 
danger.  I  too  am  a  fine  sailor  when  I  can  see 
my  face  in  the  water  from  the  upper  deck. 
It  is  the  whistle  of  the  wind  in  the  cordage, 
the  wild  plunge  of  the  vessel  down  into  the 
trough  of  the  waves,  that  takes  the  nerve  out 
of  me.  Do  you  know  what  all  fear  is  ?  All 
fear  is  unfaith.  You  can  no  more  be  afraid 
when  your  heart  is  full  of  confidence  than  you 
can  be  hungry  when  your  stomach  is  full  of 
food.  There  are  no  two  things  so  much  alike, 
and  so  unlike,  as  courage  and  temerity,  and  as 
faith  and  presumption.  In  their  incipient 
stages  you  have  to  tie  a  pink  ribbon  around 
faith  to  tell  it  from  presumption,  just  as  the 
mothers  of  twins  do  around  the  finger  of  one 
of  the  babies  to  tell  it  from  the  other.  But 
when  they  are  full  grown  the  difference  is  an- 
97 


tipodal.  Presumption  believes  that  it  can  do 
anything  it  wants  to  do  ;  Faith  believes  that  it 
can  do  anything  that  it  ought  to  do.  It  is  a 
shame  and  a  sin  to  doubt  that  you  can  acom- 
plish  anything  that  is  your  duty.  Plunge  into 
water,  dash  through  fire,  defy  frost,  if  a  duty 
lies  on  the  other  side.  You  may  burn,  you 
may  drown,  you  may  freeze,  but  nothing  can 
harm  you.  Do  you  understand  that  ?  If  you 
do,  you  know  the  secret  of  life. 


Choose  you  this  day  'whom  ye 
<witt  serve  {Josh*  24  :  IS), 

'TO  TRAIN  the  mind  to  a  swift,  free,  in- 
telligent, and  right  choice  between  the 
alternatives  of  existence  is  to  me  the  sum  and 
substance  of  our  business  of  life.  This  busi- 
ness is  not  to  think  profoundly,  nor  to  act 
bravely,  so  much  as  to  choose  wisely,  for  upon 
right  choice  all  else  depends.  Never  leave  an 
important  matter  to  accident.  Never  "flip  a 
cent,"  nor  "cut  a  pack  of  cards,"  nor  consult 
a  fortune-teller,  nor  let  others  choose  for  you. 
How  the  mind  shrinks  back  from  the  pain  ot 
decision  !  No  matter, — force  it  on.  Make 
it  "take  a  decision,"  as  a  good  fox-hunter 
compels  a  reluctant  horse  to  "  take  "  a  ditch 
or  a  fence.      Don't  be  a  straw  in  a  current,  a 

98 


leaf  in  a  wind,  a  boy  in  a  crowd.  '  *  Choose 
her  or  lose  her"  is  the  stern  mandate  that 
God  has  written  over  the  door  of  fortune,  and 
also  eternal  life.  "  Choose  me  or  lose  me  " 
he  has  also  inscribed  over  the  portal  of  his 
own  palace. 

Jesus  therefore,  being  Wearied  (Jonn  4:6), 

A  ND  so  the  " divine  man"  also  suffered 
fatigue.  Well,  without  it,  he  would  never 
have  known  the  sweetness  of  rest,  and  no  more 
would  you  and  I.  But  full  of  blessings  as 
hours  of  fatigue  may  be,  they  are  dangerous 
too,  and  we  must  look  out  for  the  perils  of 
physical  prostration.  It  is  through  the  shadows 
of  these  hours  that  the  assassins  of  hope  and 
joy  steal  upon  us.  Most  people  do  not  know 
what  is  the  matter  with  them  when  they  are 
tired.  They  think  that  the  whole  world  is  out 
of  joint,  while  the  real  trouble  is  in  their  own 
joints  !  I  have  seen  men  who  always  thought 
that  the  voices  of  their  children  were  twice  as 
loud,  the  coffee  three  times  as  weak,  and  the 
bread  four  times  as  heavy,  at  night  as  in  the 
morning.  I  wonder  they  never  learn  that 
tired  eyes  and  ears  see  and  hear  double.  Be- 
ware of  the  "tired  hours,"  Little  Bill! 
Things  are  never  anywhere  near  so  dark  and 
bad  as  they  seem  to  you  when  you  come  home 
99 


from  a  football  game  with  your  nose  all  bloody, 
your  arms  all  bruised,  and  your  legs  and  back 
aching  so  that  you  can  hardly  sit  up  at  the 
table.  Jesus  was  just  as  tired  as  you  are,  and, 
no  doubt,  things  looked  just  as  dark  some- 
times ;  but  he  was  never  cross,  and  he  always 
knew  that,  when  he  got  rested,  they  would  look 
brighter. 


Thou  preparest  a  table  before  me  in  the 
presence  of  mine  enemies  (Psa.  23  :  5), 

T  T  ERE  is  a  swift,  brilliant,  fleeting  glimpse 
*  of  another  method  of  God's  providence. 
It  is  not  his  idea  of  the  education  of  men 
never  to  give  them  sight  and  fight  of  their 
enemies.  He  does  not  take  them  to  solitary 
and  safe  retreats  to  feed  them.  He  spreads 
their  tables  in  the  very  presence  of  their  foes 
to  give  them  nerve.  There  was  once  a  general 
who  educated  his  horses  to  tranquillity  amidst 
confusion  and  danger  by  putting  their  oats  on 
the  heads  of  the  drums  and  having  the  drummers 
beat  them  while  the  trembling  animals  were 
feeding.  Victory  is  inscribed  on  the  banners 
of  the  army  that  is  able  to  take  its  rations  in 
the  presence  of  an  enemy.  The  man  who  can 
eat  and  sleep  in  the  face  of  disaster  will  never 
know  final  defeat. 

ioo 


When  they  were  fully  awake,  they 
saw  his  glory  (Luke  9  :  32), 

TT  IS  only  when  we  are  wide  awake  that  we 
see  the  real  glories  of  life.  How  different 
the  world  and  life  itself  looks  to  those  who  are 
half  asleep  !  Did  you  ever  notice  the  differ- 
ence in  the  faces  of  the  people  when  they  start 
for  town  in  the  morning,  and  come  home  at 
night  ?  At  night  the  people  are  all  hunched 
over,  cross,  dispirited,  and  gloomy.  In  the 
morning  every  man  thinks  he  is  going  to  make 
a  hundred  dollars  before  sunset  !  How  differ- 
ent the  country  looks  to  you  after  you  have 
been  fishing  all  day,  and  have  a  five-mile  walk 
to  get  home,  from  what  it  did  when  you  set 
out,  fresh  from  a  long  night's  sleep,  in  the 
morning!  It  is  just  as  beautiful  in  the  even- 
ing light  as  in  the  morning,  but  it  doesn't  look 
so.  You  are  half  asleep,  and  cross.  Every- 
thing seems  ugly  and  gloomy.  Judge  life  by 
the  morning  hours. 

A 

Every  one  that  belie<oeth  on  him  shall 
receive  remission  of  sins  (Acts  10  :  43), 

T   PUT  all  other  mysteries  of  the  visible  or 
invisible  world  second  to  that  of  the  re- 
mission of  sin  through  confession  and  pardon. 
It  is  wonderful  to  see  light  dispel  darkness,  to 
see  water  cleanse  the  soil  of  our   garments, 

IOI 


magnetism  attract  iron  filings,  electricity  pro- 
pel cars,  Rontgen  rays  pierce  solid  iron,  Mar- 
coni receive  a  message  across  the  ocean  without 
wires  !  We  are  so  fashioned  that  when  we 
open  our  minds  to  the  full  force  of  these  mys- 
teries we  are  moved  to  awe.  But  I  am  moved 
more  deeply  still  when  I  see  a  little  child  with 
a  guilty  conscience  creep  into  its  mother's 
arms,  confess  its  sin,  and  feel  the  pain  and  an- 
guish die  away  at  her  words  of  pardon  ;  and  to 
see  a  man  whose  life  has  been  base  and  vile 
prostrate  himself  before  God  in  agony,  pour 
out  his  soul  in  penitence,  and  suddenly  be- 
come so  conscious  of  forgiving  love  as  to  rise 
in  a  hushed  and  awful  gladness, — this  is  the 
greatest  marvel  of  existence. 


/  shall  not  want  (Psa.  23  :  /). 

TJOW  to  hold  that  sublime  faith  in  provi- 
*  *  dence  consistently  with  a  sense  of  per- 
sonal responsibility  for  daily  bread  and  clothing, 
is  a  psychological  as  well  as  a  religious  prob- 
lem. To  live  tranquilly,  like  a  sheep  in  a 
green  meadow  by  a  still  running  brook,  and 
also  like  a  man  with  grocers'  and  butchers' 
and  shoemakers'  bills  to  be  met  at  the  first  of 
the  month,  is  no  child's  play.  To  have  strug- 
gled heroically  until  one  is  fifty  without  a 
102 


dollar  in  the  bank  to  show  for  it ;  to  realize 
that  one's  "  productive  period  "  will  terminate 
in  a  decade,  and  yet  to  look  forward  with  a 
sublime  faith  that  we  "  shall  not  want,"  while 
life  gets  harder  every  day  and  each  gray  hair 
and  wrinkle  shuts  another  door  against  us, — 
this  is  a  sublime  achievement.  But  let  us  re- 
member that  our  necessities  never  equal  our 
wants;  that  it  is  our  imaginary  wants  which 
are  so  numerous,  while  our  real  wants  are  very 
few,  and  that  hundreds  of  us  would  have  never 
known  want  at  all  if  we  had  not  first  known 
waste.  And  let  us  remember  also  that  it  is 
easy  to  exaggerate  the  importance  of  all  our 
own  fuming  and  fussing  to  supply  our  daily  re- 
current needs.  For,  after  all,  it  is  God's  sun 
and  rain,  his  wind  and  steam,  his  heart  and 
arm,  that  really  keep  us  from  need. 


For  am  I  in  the  place  of  God?  {Gen*  50  :  19.) 

\7ENGEANCE  is  the  prerogative  of  God. 
"  Vengeance  is  mine;  I  will  repay,  saith 
the  Lord."  Nothing  is  more  presumptuous, 
nothing  more  dangerous,  nothing  more  cer- 
tain to  "work  backward,"  to  "blowout  at 
the  breech,"  than  the  effort  to  stand  in  the 
place  of  God  when  it  comes  to  the  matter  of 
''righting  wrongs."  Society  has  to  restrain, 
103 


but  not  ' '  vindicate. ' '  Only  God  knows  ex- 
actly what  retribution  to  mete  out  to  wrong 
doers.  But  there  is  a  way  in  which  we  may 
try  to  stand  "in  the  place  of  God."  It  is  by 
doing  good.  And  there  is  no  other  joy  so 
profound  as  the  feeling,  "I  am  doing  God's 
work,  I  am  standing  in  the  place  of  God," — 
to  this  poor  little  orphan  boy,  to  this  widow 
and  her  fatherless  children,  to  this  poor  con- 
vict who  has  just  come  out  of  prison,  to  this 
traveler  who  has  fallen  among  thieves,  to  this 
prodigal  who  has  come  to  himself.  Every 
true-hearted  man  or  woman  knows  by  some 
sweet  experience  what  it  is  to  have  that  deep 
and  almost  awful  feeling,  as  if  one  were  the 
good  God  himself,  when  protecting  some  poor 
child  of  misfortune. 

He  restoreth  my  soul  {Psa.  23  :  3)* 

DESTORATION  maybe  said  to  be  thekey- 
*^  word  to  the  philosophy  of  the  Bible. 
That  great  book  is  saturated  with  the  ideas  of 
rejuvenation,  regeneration,  and  recovery. 
"Repent  ye  therefore  and  turn  again  that 
your  sins  may  be  blotted  out,  that  so  there 
may  come  seasons  of  refreshing  from  the  pres- 
ence of  the  Lord,  and  that  he  may  send  the 
Christ  who  hath  been  appointed  for  you,  even 
Jesus,  whom  the  heaven  must  receive  until  the 
104 


time  of  the  restoration  (American  Revision)  of 
all  things."     Without    attempting   to  fathom 
the  exact  meaning  of  these  words,  you  may 
safely  enough  grasp  with  whole-hearted  enthu- 
siasm the  general  idea  of  a  vast  and  inimitably 
recuperative  power  in  nature,  a  tendency  to 
return   from    unstable    to   stable    equilibrium, 
from  miscarriage  and  frustration  to  fruition  and 
victory,   from  death  to  life,  from  sin  to  right- 
eousness.    Growth,  and  not  decay,  is  the  law 
of  the  universe.       Restoration,    and  not  de- 
struction, is  the  aim  of  God  in  this  vast  scheme 
of  existence.      Enumerate  (if  you  only  could) 
the  times  in  which  God  has  built  you  up  from 
the  ground.     Reflect  on   the   experiences   in 
which  he  has  set  you  on  your  feet,  wiped  your 
tears,  reanimated  your  hopes,  and  from  these 
perceive  his  method  of  the  moral  government 
of  mankind. 

Went  e*bety  year  to  Jerusalem  at  the 
feast  of  the  passover  {Luke  2  :  41). 

MOT  every  fifth,  or  third,  or  every  other 
year,  but  every  year  !  With  the  steadi- 
ness of  the  swing  of  the  planets,  and  the 
changing  phases  of  the  moon,  these  faithful, 
consecrated  Jewish  people  went  to  the  house 
of  God,  and  performed  the  sacred  tasks  of  life. 
It  is  comparatively  easy  to  do  what  we  have  to 
105 


do,  and  go  where  we  have  to  go,  but  the  su- 
preme test  of  a  man  is  not  so  much  in  the  dis- 
charge of  obligatory  as  of  voluntary  and  self- 
appointed  tasks.  When  a  man  goes  to  the 
store  six  days  in  a  week  because  he  must, 
and  stays  at  home  from  church  on  Sunday  be- 
cause he  can,  there  is  a  screw  loose  in  him, 
and  he'd  better  tighten  it.  God  give  us  fewer 
brilliant,  erratic,  now-and-then  men,  but  more 
faithful,  steady,  persistent,  every-year-at-the- 
feast  men, — men  that  go,  rain  or  shine,  thick 
or  thin,  snow  or  sun.  A  man  is  not  half  a 
man  who  does  not  do  some  things  with  his 
teeth  clenched  and  his  face  set  like  a  flint. 


Wherefore  criest  thou  unto  me?  speak  unto 
the  children  of  Israel,  that  they  go 
forward  (Exod,  14  :  15), 

\~\0  NOT  imagine  that  any  one  principle  of 
*-^  life  interprets  the  whole  of  it.  Some 
one  has  just  said  comfortably  to  himself,  "If 
all  there  is  to  life  is  just  standing  still  and  see- 
ing God  do  the  business,  I  can  manage  pretty 
easily."  But  listen.  There  comes  a  time 
when  this  won't  do.  You  cannot  do  much, 
but  what  you  can  do  you  must  do.  Where- 
fore do  you  stand  there  mumbling  your  use- 
less prayers  to  God  ?  Go  forward.  Draw 
106 


your  sword.  Open  your  furrow.  Launch 
your  ship.  This  thing  awaiting  your  activity 
will  not  be  done  for  you  by  God  or  man. 
Millions  of  sunbeams,  forces  of  irresistible 
magnitude,  spirits  innumerable,  are  all  around 
you,  but  not  one  of  them  will  lift  a  finger  to 
do  that  task.  It  is  yours,  not  theirs.  God 
will  smite  the  Egyptians  with  plagues,  he  will 
roll  back  the  waters  of  the  Jordan*  he  will  take 
off  the  wheels  of  the  Egyptian  chariots,  but  if 
you  do  not  get  a  move  on  you,  and  go  for- 
ward, God  will  not  stir  a  single  muscle  in  your 
leg.  There  are  multitudes  of  fortunes  being 
lost  and  lives  being  wrecked  because  men  won't 
1  *  go  forward. ' ' 

He  that  is  faithful  in  a  very  little  is 
faithful  also  in  much  {Luke  16  :  10). 

\I7E  GAIN  self-confidence  and  the  confi- 
*  *  dence  of  others  by  the  discharge  of 
little  trusts.  What  we  do  with  them  is  a  sign 
of  what  we  shall  do  with  others.  A  little  spark 
is  as  hot  as  a  big  conflagration,  and  a  little 
drop  of  water  is  as  wet  as  a  big  flood.  What 
a  little  chap  does  with  his  pennies  is  a  pretty 
good  sign  of  what  he  will  do  with  his  dollars. 
God  trains  us  on  littles.  It  was  Corporal 
Tommie's  handling  his  "  squad"  well  that 
made  the  colonel  think  he  would  make  a  good 
107 


captain.  It  was  handling  his  "company"  well 
that  made  the  general  think  he  would  make  a 
good  colonel,  and  so  on  away  up  to  the  tcp 
of  the  ladder. 

A 

I  fell  at  his  feet  as  one  dead  (jRe<b.  I  :  17). 

O  URELY  life,  death,  the  universe,  God,  are 
***  overpowering  ;  if  one  sees  the  true  terror 
or  the  sublime  beauty  of  existence,  it  is  enough 
to  strike  him  dumb  or  dead.  To  live  amidst 
all  these  dangers  and  responsibilities  and  op- 
portunities, to  know  that  one  is  moving  resist- 
lessly  forward  into  the  eternities  and  infinities, 
that  he  is  absolutely  certain  to  see  God  face  to 
face,  that  he  will  behold  heaven  or  hell  with  his 
own  eyes,  is  fearful!  But  God  says,  "Fear 
not."  Live  in  trust.  Exist  in  hope.  Go 
forward.  Yes,  let  us  go  forward.  We  are  as 
safe  in  his  hands  as  a  drop  of  water  in  an 
ocean. 

The  good  things  to  come  (Heb.  9  :  ft). 

T^HE  good  things  (yes,  the  best  things)  are 
all  "  to  come."  The  golden  age  of  the 
world  is  not  in  the  past,  but  the  future.  The 
richest  blessings  of  the  individual  life  are  not 
in  infancy  and  youth,  but  in  maturity  and  old 
age  ;  not  in  this  present  life,  but  in  the  one  to 
108 


which  this  is  only  the  vestibule.  You  get  away 
from  Christ  and  his  apostles  in  proportion  as 
you  live  in  the  past,  or  in  proportion  as  you 
distrust  the  future.  To-morrow  must  be  better 
than  to-day,  or,  at  any  rate,  next  year  than 
this.  "The  best  is  yet  to  be,"  and  yet  (mind 
this)  this  great  law  fulfils  itself  only  to  those 
who  love  the  best,  who  believe  in  the  best,  and 
who  seek  the  best.  The  physical  eye  only 
perceives  the  light  or  darkness  which  exists. 
The  eye  of  the  soul  creates  its  own  darkness 
and  light  ! 

A 

Ifeceive  ye  the  Holy  Spirit  {John  20  :  22). 

TO  DOUBT  the  possibility  of  receiving  the 
gift  bestowed  upon  those  apostles  is  to 
question  the  deepest  experience  of  life.  Let 
others  tell  you  ' '  how ' '  you  may  receive  it. 
Let  me  tell  you  that  it  is  possible.  A  new 
spirit  really  takes  possession  of  men.  Call  it 
by  what  name  you  will,  cherish  what  theory 
you  may  about  it,  only  believe  in  it,  and  strive 
to  attain  it  !  There  is  a  gate  that  can  be 
opened  to  the  stream  of  spiritual  power  that 
washes  against  your  soul.  There  is  a  door 
through  which  the  divine  spirit  can  enter. 
Thereby  men  become  stronger,  purer,  holier  ! 
Stephen  received  it ;  Saul  of  Tarsus  did  ;  so 
did  Luther,  Chalmers,  Moody,  and  millions  of 
109 


others.  Do  not  measure  yourselves  by  what 
strength  you  now  possess.  The  soul  is  as  ca- 
pable of  receiving  an  outside  force  into  itself 
as  is  the  electric  engine. 


This  book  of  the  la<w  shall  not  depart 
out  of  thy  mouth  {Josh,  I  :  8). 

TT  WOULD  be  a  grand  thing  to  know  intel- 
lectually all  the  ethical  and  spiritual  prin- 
ciples in  the  world,  but  it  would  be  far  better 
to  know  a  few  of  them  if  they  were  always  in 
your  heart  and  mouth.  Suppose  a  man  sim- 
ply knew  the  Ten  Commandments  and  the 
Beatitudes,  but  never  for  an  instant  lost  con- 
sciousness of  them,  do  you  think  that  he  would 
go  far  astray  ?  Life  is  fearfully  intricate.  No 
man  could  ever  know  too  much  to  meet  all  the 
emergencies  that  might  arise  in  being  king, 
president,  or  emperor.  But  every  day  im- 
presses me  anew  with  the  fact  that  with  the 
two  simple  laws  of  Jesus  "in  his  heart  and  in 
his  mouth,"  any  man  could  pass  safely  through 
life  in  this  world,  and  probably  through  the  life 
of  any  other  universe,  without  so  much  as 
stubbing  a  toe.  It  is  ignorance  of  the  laws  of 
being,  it  is  having  to  play  the  game  of  life 
without  knowing  its  rules,  that  makes  barbar- 
ism so  dreadful. 

no 


He  was  passing  through  {Luke  17  :  //). 

\\  7HAT  a  rare  and  beautiful  nature  it  is 
*  ™  which  never  loses  a  chance  to  do  good 
even  when  it  is  ''passing  through"  !  Many 
of  us  do  a  few  good  deeds  by  making  plans  a 
good  ways  ahead,  and  become  so  absorbed  in 
what  we  are  aiming  at  that  we  never  think  of 
anything  that  happens  on  the  way  or  while  we 
are  "passing  through."  Like  a  cannon-ball 
we  pass  by  everything  else,  and  go  straight  to 
the  mark,  well  satisfied  if  we  hit  that.  Jesus 
seemed  to  be  alive  to  everything  which  hap- 
pened on  the  way.  Many  of  his  most  beauti- 
ful deeds  were  what  you  might  call  mere 
"asides,"  like  helping  Lazarus  and  the  Sa- 
maritan woman. 


cAnd  Saul  was  consenting  unto 
his  death  {Acts  8  :  I). 

\  ITTLE  BILL  came  home  the  other  night 
***  with  his  eyes  sticking  out  of  his  head, 
and  stuttered  almost  unintelligibly  as  he  told 
his  father  how  Tom  Titmouse  had  broken  into 
his  mother's  pantry  and  stolen  dried  plums. 
"Turn  your  pockets  inside  out,  Little  Bill," 
said  his  father, — and  they  were  full  of  plums. 
"My  son,"  he  asked  sternly,  "don't  you 
know  that  the  partaker  is  as  bad  as  the  thief?  " 
in 


"No,",  said  Little  Bill  in  blank  amazement. 
And  he  really  didn't  !  Saul  of  Tarsus  found 
it  out  to  his  sorrow  when  his  spiritual  eyes 
were  opened.  Oh,  how  little  it  takes  to  "give 
consent"  to  evil  !  Holding  other  men's 
clothes  does  it.  Holding  our  tongues  does 
it.  Keeping  a  secret  does  it.  Sometimes  an 
approving  smile  does  it.  We  have  been  guilty 
a  thousand  times,  when  we  ought  to  have 
spoken  out,  repudiated,  spurned,  denounced, 
some  evil  deed,  and  did  not  do  it. 


The  ivord  of  Jehovah  "was  precious 
in  those  days  (/  Sam*  3  :  /)• 

T^HAT  is  a  terrible  infirmity  in  human  nature 
*  that  identifies  preciousness  with  rareness. 
In  reality  the  most  common  things  are  the 
most  sacred.  It  is  only  in  imagination  that 
the  rare  possess  such  worth.  Air,  earth,  and 
water  are  of  infinitely  more  importance  than 
emeralds,  pearls,  and  rubies.  If  we  should 
find  a  deposit  of  diamonds  that  made  them 
as  plenty  as  gravel,  we  should  use  them  for 
roads  without  reluctance.  When  copies  of 
the  Bible  were  so  few  that  they  were  chained 
to  pillars  in  churches,  people  almost  worshiped 
them  like  idols.  But  now,  when  they  exist 
by  millions,  they  value  them  as  little  as  news- 

112 


papers.  For  one,  I  have  deliberately  set  my- 
self the  task  of  appreciating  the  common  things 
of  life.  I  am  trying  to  give  their  true  value  to 
daisies,  buttercups,  robins,  dogs,  and  horses. 
I  don't  want  to  despise  geniuses  like  Paderew- 
ski  and  Tennyson  and  Browning ;  but  I  want 
to  love  and  appreciate  common  people.  I 
want  to  feel  that  it  is  not  only  the  thought, 
the  emotion,  the  vision,  that  visits  me  on  in- 
frequent and  rare  occasions,  but  those  that 
haunt  my  common  hours,  that  I  ought  to 
cherish  as  divine. 


Teace  be  to  this  house  {Luke  10  :  5). 

"I17HAT  a  crime  it  is  to  introduce  an  element 
"  of  discord  into  a  human  habitation  ! 
It  is  a  divine  art  always  to  bring  peace  with  us. 
We  shall  not  do  it  without  the  most  exquisite 
care  and  skill.  Homes  are  full  of  explosives. 
The  scratch  of  a  cross  word  is  like  the  touch 
of  a  match  to  a  powder-mine.  We  do  not 
know  how  we  are  rubbing  people  the  wrong 
way  unless  we  watch  them  closely.  We  may 
be  innocent  of  any  intention  to  make  trouble, 
and  yet  be  making  it  all  the  time.  We  had 
better  "examine"  ourselves  if  people  grow 
silent  when  we  come  around,  or  if  they  leave 
the  room. 

"3 


He  entered,  as  his  custom  <rvas,  into  the 
synagogue  on  the  sabbath  day  {Luke  4  :  16), 

OOCIETY  is  full  of  people  who  repudiate  or 
^  ignore  the  obligation  of  church  attend- 
ance, and  yet  insist  on  retaining  the  name  and 
privileges  of  the  disciples  of  Jesus  Christ.  To 
me  this  is  incomprehensible,  unless  the  obli- 
gation on  "  the  disciple  to  be  as  his  master  " 
has  been  annulled.  If  the  great  Head  of  our 
system  of  life  and  worship  felt  the  need  and 
maintained  the  habit  of  "entering  the  syna- 
gogue on  the  sabbath  day,"  by  what  principle 
of  reasoning  can  his  professed  followers  escape 
this  obligation  ?  "As  his  custom  was. ' '  How 
the  sense  of  the  bane  and  blessing  oi  "habit  " 
deepens  in  us  with  increasing  years  !  Of  all 
evils  there  is  nothing  comparable  to  a  bad 
habit ;  but  of  all  beatitudes  there  is  nothing 
so  admirable  as  a  good  one.  Force  yourselves 
into  doing  good  things  until  you  do  them 
either  unconsciously  or  without  disinclination. 
You  can  succeed  at  last,  and  when  that  end  is 
attained  you  will  have  saved  yourself  infinite 
trouble.  What  can  be  more  terrible  than 
having  to  debate  a  duty  every  time  its  per- 
formance is  called  for?  Settle  it  for  good  and 
all.  Drive  yourself  into  doing  it  until  it  is 
harder  to  leave  it  undone.  I  can't  remember 
Wing  seriously  debated  with  myself  a  dozen 
unes  in  my  life  whether  I  should  go  "  into  the 
114 


synagogue  on  the  sabbath  day"  or  not.  It 
never  occurs  to  me  to  raise  the  question.  My 
parents  got  me  so  thoroughly  into  the  church- 
going  habit  when  I  was  a  child  that  my  legs 
would  carry  my  head  to  church  in  spite  of  it- 
self. Some  people  will  say,  ''That's  slavery, 
and  the  man  is  a  victim."  Well,  let  them. 
Those  same  people  would  condemn  the  habit 
of  a  mother's  bathing  her  baby  daily,  or  a 
man's  kissing  his  wife  every  morning  when  he 
started  for  his  store. 


<All  the  congregation  .  ♦  ♦  were 
(with  him  (/  Kings  8:5). 

\1  7HAT  could  he  have  done  unless  they  had 
**  been  "with  him  "  ?  Any  leader  is  in- 
vincible when  thus  surrounded.  But  what 
can  a  general  do  on  the  field  of  battle  with  his 
army  asleep  in  the  barracks?  What  can  a 
minister  do  with  his  congregation  playing  on 
the  golf-links  ?  What  can  a  teacher  do  with 
his  class  in  the  woods  gathering  chestnuts  ? 
Sometimes  it  is  the  leader's  fault  if  he  cannot 
keep  his  followers  "with  him."  But,  unless 
I  misread  the  symptoms  of  our  modern  social 
infirmities,  there  are  times  when  multitudes  of 
congregations  have  been  stampeded  by  the 
devils  of  worldliness.  There  is  this  curious 
phenomenon, — that  the  greatest  and  wisest 
ii5 


leaders  in  church  and  Sunday-school  are  hav- 
ing about  as  hard  work  to  keep  the  people 
"with  them"  as  the  least  and  feeblest.  It's 
an  inviolable  maxim  that  the  minister  is  help- 
less if  the  congregation  does  not  "stand  by." 


cAnd  there  ariseth  a  great  storm 
of  wind  {Mark  4  :  37). 

Y\0  NOT  think  for  a  moment  that  the  pres- 
■L^  ence  of  Jesus  Christ  in  the  ship  of  your 
life  will  keep  the  storms  from  blowing.  There 
are  moments  of  religious  excitement  when 
preachers  and  teachers  lay  the  reins  on  the 
necks  of  their  thought-horses  and  get  run 
away  with.  We  sometimes  paint  very  rosy 
pictures  of  the  voyage  of  life  "  with  Jesus  at 
the  helm."  We  are  so  anxious  to  get  our 
friends  to  embark  that  we  call  a  very  stormy 
ocean  a  quiet  inland  lake,  and  represent  the 
happy  voyagers  as  lolling  on  the  decks  and 
sailing  on  an  even  keel.  That  may  be  your 
way  of  getting  to  the  desired  haven,  but  it  has 
not  been  mine.  I  have  heard  the  wind  howl 
through  the  rigging,  and  seen  it  split  the  sails. 
I  have  felt  the  waves  wash  over  the  gunwales. 
I  have  been  hoisted  by  them  until  my  ship  has 
hit  the  clouds,  and  gone  down  into  their 
troughs  until  the  keel  has  scraped  the  bottom. 
116 


And  I  cannot  yet  say  that  I  hope  I'll  never 
see  another  storm.  I  had  almost  as  soon 
navigate  a  glue-pot  as  an  ocean  that  never 
broke  into  white-caps.  How  should  we  value 
the  haven  without  the  tempest  ?  The  disci- 
ples never  would  have  heard  the  "Peace,  be 
still,"  without  the  "'great  storm  of  wind." 


For  thus  it  becometh  us  to  fulfil 
all  righteousness  {cMztt.  3  :  15), 

"  I  ET  us  perform  this  deed  [distasteful, 
^  perhaps,  to  both  of  them, — to  John, 
because  of  his  conscious  unworthiness,  and  to 
Jesus  on  account  of  its  publicity]  to  meet  the 
claims  of  a  law  above  our  own  desires  or 
wills."  There  is  such  a  law  for  you  and  for 
me.  There  is  an  eternal  fitness  in  things  to 
which  we  must  subordinate  all  individual 
preferences.  The  great  stream  of  events  is 
flowing  in  the  channel  of  righteousness  toward 
the  goal  of  holiness.  Within  those  banks  we 
must  order  the  course  of  our  lives.  Nothing 
is  so  sublime  or  satisfying  as  to  do  a  thing 
simply  because  it  is  right  !  The  less  you 
know  about  the  why  and  wherefore  of  that 
Tightness,  the  mort  profound  is  the  joy  of 
obedience.  To  go  to  death  against  all  other 
inclinations  but  those  of  the  soul  towards  duty, 
117 


to  go  in  the  dark,  to  go  contrary  to  all  ap- 
parent reason,  evidence,  and  even  common- 
sense  (as  a  fireman  rushes  into  a  burning 
building  to  save  a  deformed  and  dying  child), 
— this,  in  spite  of  all  argument  to  the  contrary, 
fills  a  human  soul  with  its  greatest  ecstasy. 
Whatever  is  right,  do  it, — do  it  all,  do  it  to 
the  last  hair's-breadth.  Fulfil  all  righteous- 
ness.  Do  not  put  a  few  stingy  and  regretful 
acts  into  the  cup,  but  fill  it  full  to  the  brim. 


o4s  for  me,  it  <was  in  my  heart  to 
build  a.  house  (/  Chron.  28:  2), 

Tl  OW  much  there  is  in  every  heart  that 
never  gets  incorporated  into  word  or 
deed !  And  did  you  ever  notice  how  men 
minimize  the  moral  significance  of  their  unreal- 
ized evil  thoughts,  and  maximize  the  moral 
significance  of  their  unrealized  good  thoughts  ? 
If  it  is  "in  a  man's  heart"  to  lie  or  steal  or 
blaspheme  or  kill,  he  thinks  but  little  less  of 
himself,  so  long  as  his  emotions  did  not  become 
actions.  But  let  a  man  have  the  most  fleeting 
and  sterile  inclination  to  give  a  dollar  to  a 
cause,  or  lend  a  helpful  hand  to  a  beggar,  or 
found  a  hospital  for  the  sick,  or  build  a  church 
for  the  masses,  and  he  actually  thinks  he  is  as 
good  as  if  he  had  done  it.  It  was  in  Little 
118 


Bill's  heart  to  help  his  mama.  A  look  of 
beatific  self-satisfaction  was  on  his  face  as  he 
asked  her,  with  all  the  air  of  a  young  courtier, 
"Can't  I  do  something  else?  "  when  he  had 
finished  a  trifling  task.  But  when  she  said, 
"Yes,  dear;  you  can  clean  the  cellar,"  he 
humped  his  shoulders  and  looked  like  a  thun- 
der-cloud. It  really  wasn't  in  his  heart.  It 
was  only  "in  his  eye."  It's  very  hard  to 
tell  what's  in  your  heart  from  what  is  only  "in 
your  eye." 

& 

We  *h>ould  that  thou  shouldest  do  for  us 
'tohatsoe'ber  <toe  shall  ask  {Mark  10  :  35). 

CVEN  the  best  of  them  could  not  get  rid 
^  of  the  desire  for  personal  aggrandize- 
ment. It  was  not  the  reform  of  evils,  but  the 
advancement  of  self,  that  animated  them. 
They  restrained  these  feelings  as  long  as  they 
could,  but  they  finally  burnt  out  into  sight. 
"Grant  unto  us  that  we  may  sit,  one  on  thy 
right  hand,  and  one  on  thy  left  hand,  in  thy 
glory. ' '  Well,  how  much  better  are  we  ?  We 
are  less  frank,  but  are  we  any  less  selfish  ? 
Who  of  us  loses  sight  of  the  preferment,  pres- 
tige, and  recognition  that  come  through  re- 
ligious and  charitable  work  ?  There  is  a  story 
of  two  colored  men  in  Washington  who  were 
appointed  a  committee  to  pick  out  a  candidate 
119 


for  an  important  political  office.  After  a  while 
one  of  them  came  back  into  the  meeting,  and 
asked  for  an  extension  of  time.  "  Mr.  Chair- 
man," he  said  very  solemnly,  "the  committee 
is  divided.  Mr.  Johnson,  he's  for  hisself,  and 
I'm  for  myself,  and  we're  having  hard  work  to 
get  together  !  "  If  we  could  get  at  the  bot- 
tom facts  of  the  failure  of  many  benevolent 
enterprises,  they  could  be  summed  up  in  this 
naive  confession  of  the  colored  man, — "he's 
for  hisself,  and  I'm  for  myself." 


And  I  <witt  establish  bis  kingdom  for  ever,  if  he  be 
constant  to  do  my  commandments  and 
mine  ordinances,  as  at  this  day 
(/    Chron.   28   :   7). 

\17HAT  we  want  in  manhood  is  not  to  spurt 
like  a  geyser,  but  to  flow  like  a  water- 
fall. It  is  all  right  to  see  a  man  do  his  task 
"to-day,"  but  we  want  to  know  if  he  did  it 
yesterday  and  will  do  it  to-morrow.  He  must 
have,  not  the  spasmodic  pull  of  a  man  drawing 
corks  from  bottles,  but  the  eternal  pull  of 
gravity  holding  planets.  If  it  were  only  cer- 
tain that  every  Sunday-school  teacher  and 
scholar  who  was  in  his  place  on  "this"  day 
would  be  in  his  place  next  Sunday  and  next 
year!  "Were  man  but  constant,  he  were 
120 


perfect,"  said  Shakespeare.  And,  speaking 
sadly  after  studying  human  nature  through  a 
long  lifetime,  Confucius  lamented:  "  A  good 
man  it  is  not  mine  to  see.  Could  I  see  a  man 
possessed  of  constancy,  that  would  satisfy  me." 
Most  of  us  have  only  the  constancy  of  the 
leech,  which  lets  go  at  the  instant  when  he  has 
sucked  all  the  blood  he  can  hold.  One  some- 
times longs  for  men  with  the  constancy  of  the 
bull-dog,  which  hangs  on  just  for  the  sake  of 
not  letting  go. 

cA  man  hawing  a  withered 
fiand{€Matt.  12:10). 

M  OT  being  a  physician,  I  will  not  attempt 
*  ^  to  diagnose  the  trouble  with  this  poor 
fellow.  But  the  profession  of  the  ministry  has 
brought  me  into  contact  with  many  another 
withered  hand  (and,  for  that  matter,  withered 
head  and  withered  heart),  which  I  understand 
quite  perfectly.  No  fact  in  nature  is  more 
familiar,  and  no  law  more  demonstrable,  than 
that  of  the  withering  up  of  all  disused  faculties 
or  organs.  It  is  known  to  science  as  atrophy. 
After  a  while  nothing  is  left  of  a  disused  fac- 
ulty or  organ  but  a  vestige.  Vestigial  remains 
are  mere  tombstones,  the  pale  memorials  of 
powers  that  have  now  ceased  to  be.  I  know 
a  rich  man  (many  such)  who  has  a  withered 

121 


hand.  He  ceased  to  stretch  it  out  to  help  his 
fellows,  and  now  it  is  only  a  "  vestigial  re- 
main." He  cannot  use  it  when  he  tries.  I 
know  a  woman  (oh,  multitudes  !)  who  has  a 
withered  heart.  She  would  not  open  it  to  the 
sorrows  of  others,  and  it  has  dried  up  until  it 
rattles  around  in  her  breast  like  a  pea  in  a  pod. 
I  know  a  boy  (the  woods  are  full  of  them) 
whose  brain  is  withering  up  like  a  leaf  on  an 
August  day.  He  won't  study,  and  he  has 
already  got  to  a  point  where  he  can't  think. 
Instead  of  the  convolutions  of  his  brain  unfold- 
ing, they  are  continually  contracting  upon 
themselves.  If  he  only  knew  the  terror  of  it, 
the  last  thing  on  earth  a  fellow  would  want  to 
become  would  be  a  "  vestigial  remain. ' ' 


They  found  htm  in  the  temple  {Luke  2:  46). 

ANDa  very  good  place  it  was  to  be  found 
**•  in.  Where  would  you  be  most  likely  to 
be  found  if  your  friends  should  hunt  for  you  ? 
When  Little  Bill  "turns  up  missing"  we  can 
almost  invariably  locate  him  in  a  little  ravine 
back  of  the  church,  "building  a  shanty"  out 
of  some  old  bricks  and  boards.  There  is  a 
natural  gravitation  in  every  one  of  us  toward 
some  favorite  occupation  and  locality.  Every 
man  goes  "  to  his  own  place  " — like  Dives  and 
122 


Lazarus.  Some  mothers  always  have  to  hunt 
for  their  boys  on  the  street  corners,  or  in  the 
candy  store  where  there  is  a  slot  machine. 
How  many  broken-hearted  wives  there  are 
who  make  their  way  by  a  trained  instinct  to 
some  saloon,  when  their  husbands  have  to  be 
hunted  up  at  midnight  !  Some  have  to  follow 
them  to  the  gambling  hell.  When  you  come 
to  think  about  it,  it's  a  pretty  sharp  test  of 
character  to  ask  a  man's  friends  where  he'd  be 
most  likely  to  be  found. 


€Make  his  paths  straight  (Matt.  3:  J). 

TWO  of  life's  noblest  occupations  are  those 
*  of  the  ''pathfinder"  and  the  ''road- 
builder."  To  discover  a  route  through  an 
impenetrable  wilderness,  and  to  construct  a 
highway  of  granite  rocks  or  steel  rails  for  com- 
merce and  for  travel, — both  are  very  great. 
But  it  is  still  grander  to  break  through  a  wil- 
derness of  superstitions  and  mysteries,  and  lay 
a  straight  and  broad  highway  to  God.  Abra- 
ham and  Moses  were  road-builders  in  this 
sense,  and  so  was  John  the  Baptist.  He 
opened  the  path  over  which  Jesus  walked,  and 
which  he  widened  to  a  great  world  highway  up 
to  heaven.  And  he  broke  it  "straight."  No 
crooked,  winding,  sinuous,  serpentine  paths 
123 


for  him.  He  believed  that  men  must  go  to 
God  as  the  crow  flies,  or  not  at  all.  One  of 
the  tsars  of  Russia  wanted  a  railroad  construc- 
ted from  St.  Petersburg  to  Moscow.  The 
engineers  brought  him  a  map  with  a  line  zig- 
zagging everywhere.  "  Why  have  you  made 
it  crooked  ?  "  he  asked.  "To  avoid  hills  and 
valleys,"  they  replied.  "Build  it  this  way," 
he  said,  laying  a  rule  across  the  map  and 
drawing  a  pencil  along  its  edge.  That  is  the 
way  to  build  the  pathway  of  a  man's  life. 
Make  it  straight,  my  boy ! 


cAnd  they  feared  as  they  entered 
into  the  cloud  {Luke  9  :  34). 

Yl  7HAT  a  strange  influence  darkness   and 
*  shadow  have  over  us  all  !     I  was  never 

so  scared  in  my  life  as  when  the  Mt.  Vesuvius 
elevator  car  shot  right  into  a  big  black  cloud. 
Wendell  Phillips  is  authority  for  saying  that 
"when  geese  enter  a  barn  door  they  duck 
their  heads,  for  fear  of  hitting  the  top  sill." 
I  know  it  is  hard  for  us  not  to  duck  and  crouch 
when  we  enter  darkness  of  any  kind,  and  espe- 
cially a  cloud  of  sorrow.  The  whole  discipline 
of  life  is  to  teach  us  how  to  enter  every  kind 
of  darkness  without  a  tremor.  Do  not  be 
afraid  of  the  night.  Do  not  be  afraid  of  a 
124 


thunder-cloud.  Do  not  be  afraid  of  a  misfor- 
tune or  a  sorrow.  Don't  crouch.  Don't 
tremble.  Walk  right  into  it  with  your  head 
up.  God  is  as  near  you  in  the  dark  as  he  is  in 
the  light.  And  this  is  the  only  real  source  of 
safety.  You  think  you  can  take  care  of  your- 
self in  the  daylight.  You  are  mistaken.  If 
God  should  withdraw  from  you  a  single  mo- 
ment, it  would  be  like  withdrawing  the  air 
from  under  the  bird.  It  is  because  his  eye 
never  slumbers  nor  sleeps,  because  his  ever- 
lasting arms  are  everlastingly  beneath  us,  that 
we  are  ever  safe. 

& 

The  running  of  the  foremost  is  tike  the 
running  of  Ahimaaz  (2  Sam,  18  :  27), 

CO,  THEN,  a  man's  personality  reveals  it- 
^  self  in  his  gait  when  he  is  miles  away, — 
does  it  ?  Well,  it  ought  to  be  a  good  gait,  if 
it  is  so  conspicuous  and  so  distinguishable. 
Little  Bill,  "toed  out,"  swung  his  hands  like 
a  pair  of  signboards  in  the  wind,  and  carried 
his  head  bent  far  forward  and  low  down  like  a 
Cayuse  pony  in  a  blizzard.  Unfortunately  he 
could  not  see  himself,  and  the  scoldings  he 
had  to  take  before  he  straightened  up  were — 
well,  a  few.  How  wonderful  it  is  that  you  can 
tell  a  man  by  his  gait  at  a  mile's  distance,  or 
by  his  footfall  on  the  pavement  when  he  turns 
125 


a  corner  on  a  dark  night  !  Self-revelation  is 
the  law  of  life.  You  cannot  hide  yourself, 
Little  Bill.  What  you  are  will  disclose  itself 
to  those  who  are  nigh,  and  even  to  those  that 
are  afar  off.  By  and  by  your  teacher  will  be 
able  to  tell  your  slovenly  writing,  and  your 
employer  your  careless  working,  just  by  the 
look  of  your  job.  This  morning's  paper  says 
that  the  police  have  been  able  to  say,  with 
complete  assurance,  that  certain  recent  bur- 
glaries were  done  by  a  famous  criminal  known 
as  "  Slick  Dick,"  just  from  their  neatness  and 
despatch.  You  had  better  not  trifle  with  the 
matter  of  your  personal  identity,  and  you  had 
better  get  a  good  gait. 

A 

We  foiled  alt  night >  and  took 
nothing  {Luke  5 :  5). 

O IMON  was  too  good  a  fisherman  to  complain 
^  about  his 'Muck."  He  had  put  in  bad 
nights  before,  and  knew  he  would  have  to  do 
it  again  and  often.  Fishing  is  an  art,  but 
many  a  time  "it  goes  by  favor."  There  were 
times  when  even  Isaak  Walton  could  not  get  a 
bite.  There  are  bad  days  for  trout,  and  bad 
nights  for  eels.  No,  no  !  the  genuine  fisher- 
man is  not  disheartened  by  bootless  hours  on 
the  lake.  And  the  genuine  hero  is  not  dis- 
heartened by  bootless  days  and  weeks  and 
126 


months,  or  even  years,  of  human  endeavor. 
There  are  poor  "times  and  seasons"  in  every 
business.  One  good  year  out  of  two  or  three 
is  about  all  we  may  expect.  But  the  tide 
turns.  It's  not  all  ebb.  There  is  a  flood  as 
well.  The  greatest  trouble  with  the  most  of 
us  lies  in  the  loss  of  faith  in  the  pond.  Go 
back  again  and  again.  Try  a  frog  if  the  fish 
won't  bite  at  a  fly,  and  do  not  even  disdain  a 
worm.  The  ocean  of  life  can  never  be  fished 
out.     A  fruitless  night  betokens  a  fruitful  day. 


Give  thy  servant  therefore  an 
understanding  heart  to  judge 
thy  people  (/  Kings  3:9). 

T  N  SPITE  of  a  thousand  nameless  despots, 
there  was  never  an  age  in  human  history 
when  so  many  governors  and  presidents, 
princes  and  kings,  emperors  and  monarchs, 
were  praying  that  prayer  of  Solomon.  The 
progress  of  the  kingdom  of  God  has  taught  the 
crowned  heads  of  the  civilized  world  that  final 
lesson  of  royal  wisdom, — that  the  people  do 
not  exist  for  the  ruler,  but  the  ruler  for  the 
people.  It  is  this  great  lesson  that  has  so- 
bered the  souls  of  these  men  who  are  "dressed 
in  a  little  brief  authority."  "A  crown's 
enough  to  ripen  any  brain."  On  his  death- 
bed Pericles  said  that  he  regarded  it  as  his  best 


title  to  an  honored  memory  "that  he  had 
never  caused  an  Athenian  to  put  on  mourn- 
ing." Men  like  President  Roosevelt,  Em- 
peror William,  the  Tsar  of  all  the  Russias,  and 
the  new  head  of  the  Roman  Catholic  Church, 
whatever  mistakes  they  make,  and  whatever 
personal  ambitions  they  may  have,  are  finding 
it  impossible  to  forget  that  the  destinies  of 
millions  of  people  are  hanging  on  their  lightest 
word.  Power  which  used  to  make  kings 
drunk  now  makes  them  sober.  The  promise 
of  better  days  for  the  world  lies  in  the  fact  that 
in  so  many  royal  closets  the  potentates  of  earth 
are  praying  the  prayer  of  Solomon,  "Give  thy 
servant  an  understanding  heart  to  judge  this 
people. ' ' 

* 

We  are  not  able  to  go  up  against  the 
people!  for  they  are  stronger 
than  ive  {Nam*  13  :  31), 

\  \  7HAT  if  they  were  stronger  ?  Beat  then, 
with  your  wits.  What  if  they  were 
wiser  ?  Beat  them  with  your  strength.  I  be- 
lieve it  is  a  divine  law  to  "take  a  fellow  bigger 
than  your  own  size,"  to  "aim  at  a  higher 
mark  than  you  can  hit."  If  you  never  try  to 
do  things  that  you  seem  incapable  of,  you  will 
accomplish  no  more  than  a  mummy.  The 
more  I  comprehend  the  magnitude  and  beauty 
128 


of  the  very  simplest  tasks  of  life,  the  more  I 
feel  my  incapacity.  One  gets  to  shrink  before 
them  ;  but  he  must  never  get  to  slink  before 
them.  Tackle  any  task  that  Providence  im- 
poses, and  any  son  of  Anak  that  opposes. 
Believe  in  God,  and  believe  in  your  own  self 
as  his  instrument 


129 


Minute  Readings  on  the 

Great  War 
* 

"Somewhere  in  France." 

EVERY  great  epoch  either  creates  new 
phrases  or  lends  a  new  significance  to  old 
ones.  Among  the  many  which  have  become 
the  very  catch-words  of  this  present  era  are 
these:  "Somewhere  in  France,"  "In  the 
Trenches,"  "Over  the  Top,"  "No  Man's 
Land,"  "Gone  West."  Each  one,  we  think, 
embodies  in  itself  a  multitude  of  those  definite 
conceptions,  or  those  vague  and  indefinable 
emotions  excited  by  the  profoundest  agitation 
which  has  ever  disturbed  the  equilibrium  of 
the  world. 

"Somewhere  in  France!"  Could  any  other 
words  more  fittingly  disclose  the  awful  un- 
certainties of  life  in  this  period  of  upheaval, 
disintegration  and  destruction?  If  any  one 
thing  seems  absolutely  necessary  to  our  feel- 
ings of  assurance,  of  stability,  of  reality,  it  is 
to  be  able  to  conceive  of  our  loved  ones  in 
some  fixed  and  known  surroundings  in  the 
old  homestead,  in  the  little  country  village, 
in  the  store,  the  shop,  the  mill.  The  moment 
they  disappear  from  view  into  a  different  en- 
131 


vironment,  another  village,  state  or  country, 
they  are  robbed  of  a  portion  of  their  being 
and  become  like  ghosts,  like  wraiths  or  appa- 
ritions. It  is  this,  perhaps,  that  constitutes 
the  greatest  obstacle  to  our  belief  in  the  per- 
sistence of  our  beings  after  death.  If  we  knew 
the  background  and  the  surroundings  of  those 
who  had  been  translated  to  another  sphere  it 
would  be  a  thousand  times  more  easy  to 
regard  them  as  being  still  alive. 

Our  sons,  our  brothers,  our  lovers,  our 
husbands  •  enlist,  are  stationed  for  a  little 
while  near  some  city  which  we  know  in  cir- 
cumstances with  which  we  easily  become 
familiar,  and  so  preserve  their  full  identity. 
But  suddenly  they  are  embarked  upon  a  ship 
and  vanish  like  stars  that  have  set,  like  flowers 
which  have  faded,  like  bubbles  which  have 
burst.  Henceforth  we  only  know  that  they 
exist  "Somewhere  in  France!"  But  where? 
In  Paris,  amidst  its  fierce  temptations,  in 
some  quiet  little  village,  in  a  hospital,  a 
trench,  a  battlefield — a  grave? 

How  hard  it  is  to  conceive  them  now! 
Such  is  their  unsubstantiality  as  to  seem  like 
nothingness  itself.  They  are  "such  stuff  as 
dreams  are  made  of,"  "the  baseless  fabric  of 
a  vision."  Dissolved  into  a  sort  of  phantom, 
we  think  about  them  rather  than  of  them, 
and  wonder  whether  they  are  real  or  not. 
132 


There  is  a  modern  song  which  we  have  often 
heard  at  funerals,  and  always  with  a  sense  of 
unrest  and  pain — " Beautiful  Isle  of  Some- 
where," we  think  its  title  is.  That  "some- 
where" seems  too  much  the  synonym  of 
nowhere! 

It  is  a  military  necessity.  We  cannot  but 
admit  that  the  places  where  our  soldiers  are 
encamped  in  France  should  be  concealed. 
We  do  not  want  them  bombed  by  aeroplanes, 
and  must  possess  our  souls  in  patience  in 
their  painful  and  futile  efforts  to  hold  them 
in  our  consciousnesses  as  existences  real  and 
true,  but  God  speed  the  day  when  they  may 
tell  us  where  they  truly,  really  are!  Yes,  God 
speed  the  day  when  we  shall  have  them  home 
again — Somewhere  in  America — at  their  old 
accustomed  places  at  the  table  and  by  the 
fireside;  in  our  arms  as  well  as  in  our  hearts; 
visible,  audible,  tangible,  localized  realities, 
and  no  longer  phantoms,  flitting  about  "Some- 
where in  France." 


i33 


"In  the  Trenches." 

YWYE  almost  dare  assert  that  there  is  not  a 
\Ar  lip  in  the  world  from  which  has  not 
fallen  again  and  again  that  picturesque  and 
pathetic  phrase,  "In  the  trenches."  Perhaps 
there  has  never  been  another  in  the  history  of 
the  race  which  has  been  so  universal.  By  a 
sort  of  inevitability  it  has  become  the  very 
symbol  of  modern  warfare,  of  discomfort,  of 
loyalty  and  of  heroic  endurance.  It  will 
probably  be  the  richest  and  most  permanent 
verbal  legacy  of  the  war. 

More  than  any  other  phrase  it  reveals  the 
change  which  has  taken  place  in  military 
science.  Without  premeditation,  so  far  as  we 
know,  the  terrible  necessities  of  the  deadlock 
after  the  Battle  of  the  Marne  compelled  the 
armies  to  dig  themselves  into  the  ground  for 
security  against  the  deadly  perils  of  artillery 
fire.  Upon  the  instant,  in  the  twinkling  of  an 
eye,  the  strategy  of  war  was  revolutionized. 
Armies  no  longer  contended  in  the  open  field, 
but  under  ground,  "in  dens  and  caves  of  the 
earth,"  like  the  heroes  of  the  twelfth  chapter 
of  the  Epistle  to  the  Hebrews.  Men  were 
metamorphosed  into  moles.  They  retraced 
the  tedious  path  of  human  progress  from 
primeval  ages,  and  in  a  moment  of  time  be- 
came "cave  men"  the  second  time.  Human 
134 


beings  who  had  been  reared  and  who  had 
dwelt  in  houses  which  were  the  products  of 
long  ages  of  ever-developing  domestic  archi- 
tecture, abodes  of  comfort  and  of  luxury, 
descended  into  ditches  streaming  with  mud 
and  swarming  with  vermin,  without  complaint 
or  protest,  and  adapted  themselves  to  condi- 
tions fit  only  for  mud  turtles  or  for  swine. 

The  story  of  this  change  of  habitat  on  the 
part  of  millions  of  civilized  men  is  one  of  the 
immortal  chapters  in  the  book  of  human  life. 
Their  endurance,  their  patience,  their  cheer- 
fulness must  challenge  the  admiration  of  their 
Creator,  even.  To  wallow  in  mud  up  to  one's 
armpits,  to  lie  down  to  sleep  in  mud,  to  eat 
it,  to  breathe  it,  even;  to  waken  suddenly 
with  the  sense  of  slimy  creatures  crawling 
over  one's  face;  to  have  rats  for  one's  hourly 
companions;  to  be  devoured  by  mosquitoes; 
to  become  the  daily  breakfast,  dinner  and 
supper  of  more  lice  than  plagued  the  Egyptians 
— this  is  what  it  is  to  be  "in  the  trenches,"  but 
it  is  not  all.  It  is,  also,  to  peer  through 
crevices  into  the  night,  or  to  lift  one's  head  a 
little  above  a  sandbag  and  get  a  bullet  in  one's 
brain.  It  is  to  trip  over  dead  bodies  half 
buried  in  the  ooze;  it  is  to  confront  horrors 
which  are  as  unimaginable  as  they  are  in- 
describable, hour  after  hour,  day  after  day, 
week  after  week,  year  after  year. 
i35 


The  pages  of  human  history  are  crowded 
with  illustrious  stories  of  courage  and  endur- 
ance. In  all  ages  men  "have  stopped  the 
mouths  of  lions,  quenched  the  power  of  fire, 
escaped  the  edge  of  the  sword,  from  weakness 
were  made  strong,  waxed  mighty  in  war, 
turned  to  flight  the  armies  of  aliens.  Women 
received  their  dead  by  a  resurrection,  and 
others  were  tortured,  not  accepting  deliver- 
ance, that  they  might  obtain  a  better  resur- 
rection. And  others  had  trial  of  mockings 
and  scourgings;  yea,  moreover,  of  bonds  and 
imprisonments;  they  were  stoned;  they  were 
sawn  asunder;  they  were  tempted;  they  were 
slain  of  the  sword;  they  went  about  in  sheep- 
skins and  goatskins,  being  destitute,  afflicted, 
tormented  (of  whom  the  world  was  not  wor- 
thy), wandering  in  deserts  and  mountains  and 
holes  of  the  earth." 

They  have  done  it  before,  it  seems!  They 
will  do  it  again  if  need  be!  They  are  indom- 
itable— these  men  and  women.  There  is 
nothing  they  will  not  do  for  some  great  ideal! 

By  the  sides  of  these  trenches  we  stand  with 
uncovered  head.  From  those  heroes  wallowing 
in  the  mud  we  derive  a  new  incentive.  Covered 
with  slime  and  ooze,  they  seem  to  us  more 
noble  than  Kings  and  Princes  in  purple  and 
fine  linen.  To  such  they  are  a  warning  and  a 
threat.  It  is  in  those  trenches  that  the  doom 
of  Kaisers  will  be  written. 
136 


"Over  the  Top." 

IN  every  dramatic  movement  there  must  be 
a  crisis.  That  one  which  begins  "Somewhere 
in  France,"  and  is  developed  "In  the  trenches," 
culminates  when  the  whistle  blows  and  the 
waiting  soldiers,  unleashed  like  tigers  in  the 
arena,  leap  "Over  the  top"  of  the  trenches. 
In  that  brief  phrase  is  compressed  more  of 
action  and  emotion  than  in  any  other  in  the 
world  to-day.  There  are  not  three  words  in 
all  the  Babel  of  languages  spoken  by  the 
billion  and  a  half  of  people  on  this  earth  a 
thousandth  part  so  full  of  all  that  is  bravest, 
noblest  and  most  daring  in  the  souls  of  men. 
However  long  the  soldiers  of  this  great  war 
live,  that  moment  of  vaulting  "Over  the  top" 
will  be  the  supreme  one  in  their  mortal  lives. 
Even  across  an  ocean  and  in  the  peace  and 
safety  of  these  quiet  homes  and  streets  of 
America  we  cannot  hear  the  shrill  whistle  of 
a  policeman,  a  dog-catcher  or  a  boy  calling 
his  companion  without  a  sudden  beating  of 
the  heart.  What  must  it  be  to  stand  in  one 
of  those  trenches,  gun  in  hand  and  watch  on 
wrist,  awaiting  that  fateful  signal?  Those 
emotions  have  been  described  by  brilliant 
writers  who  have  personally  endured  the 
tremendous  experience,  but  all  of  them  testify 
that  human  language  is  incapable  of  convey- 
i37 


ing  anything  but  the  most  vague  and  shadowy 
conception  of  the  excitement  of  the  soul  in 
that  brief  interval  of  time.  It  must  be  so. 
How  can  feeble  words  make  real  the  thunderous 
crash  of  cannon,  the  scream  of  shot  and  shell, 
the  groans  of  dying  men,  the  smell  of  burning 
powder  and  suffocating  gas,  the  sight  of 
bloody  corpses  which  just  a  moment  ago  were 
living  men,  the  ghastly  strip  of  territory 
known  as  "No  Man's  Land,"  the  barrage  of 
fire  going  before  the  advancing  columns  as 
the  pillar  of  smoke  and  fire  swept  on  before 
the  Israelites  of  old,  the  barbed  wire  fences, 
men  stabbing  each  other  with  bayonets — God! 
it  is  inconceivable  as  well  as  indescribable. 

We  have  read  of  a  delicate  English  boy  who 
crumpled  up  with  terror  and  fell  flat  in  the 
trench  when  that  horrible  whistle  sounded. 
His  captain,  finding  him  there,  and  realizing 
that  he  would  be  courtmartialed  and  shot, 
threw  him  bodily  "Over  the  top!"  And  then 
he  fought!  Good  heavens,  how  he  fought! 
Something  burst  within  his  spirit  and  he 
"saw  red." 

Other  experiences  have  also  disclosed  the 
incorruptible  and  unconquerable  courage  of 
the  souls  of  men — slow  crucifixion,  exposure 
to  lions  in  the  arena,  burnings  at  the  stake. 
Other  adventures  of  men  have  been  terrible 
and  thrilling.  But  nothing  else  has  ever 
138 


moved  us  to  profoundly  as  that  of  these  peace- 
loving  sons  and  brothers  of  ours  pulling  their 
scattered  faculties  together,  stilling  the  fierce 
throbbing  of  their  pulses,  conquering  their 
wild  terror,  and  with  one  mad,  glorious  effort 
leaping  over  the  top  of  those  trenches  into  the 
storm  of  shot  and  shell.  We  have  always 
reverenced  human  nature,  but  it  is  hard  not 
to  adore  it  now. 

Other  phrases  have  expressed  and  illustrated 
the  courage  and  devotion  of  men,  but  it  will 
be  ages  before  any  other  will  displace  from 
our  daily  conversation  this  one  as  a  symbol 
of  the  majesty  of  the  spirit  which  dwells 
within  us  in  the  transcendental  moments  of 
our  lives. 

"Over  the  top!"  Over  the  top  of  trenches 
on  the  field  of  battle;  over  the  top  of  obstacles 
in  the  path  of  progress;  over  the  tops  of  the 
waves  of  sorrow  that  threaten  to  engulf  us; 
over  the  top  of  the  great  divide  that  separates 
us  from  the  final  home  of  the  soul. 

Life  will  be  richer  and  larger  for  that  phrase. 


139 


"No  Man's  Land." 

SO  far  as  we  have  been  able  to  learn,  this 
is  a  phrase  which  had  never  before — or 
generally,  at  least — been  applied  to  that  nar- 
row belt  of  land  which  lay  between  two  armies. 
Perhaps  it  is  because  in  other  wars  it  was  a 
rapidly  shifting  territory,  or  because  it  was 
a  wider  and  less  distinctly  marked  terrain. 
No  sooner,  however,  had  trench  warfare  been 
developed  and  armies  begun  to  dig  themselves 
in  and  get  closer  and  closer  together,  until 
they  could  speak  to  each  other  across  the 
narrow  dividing  space,  then  this  phrase  sprang 
into  universal  use. 

"No  Man's  Land!"  The  territory  in  dis- 
pute, the  little  belt  of  open  country  which 
neither  army  could  appropriate  until  it  had 
been  drenched  with  human  blood — the  few 
rods  or  yards  or  feet  for  the  possession  of 
which  hundreds  of  thousands  and  even  millions 
of  men  were  ready  to  sacrifice  their  lives. 

Small  wonder  that  this  narrow,  open  road- 
way, running  for  scores  and  scores  of  miles 
(like  a  farmer's  lane  over  which  the  cows 
came  lowing  home  with  udders  full  of  milk), 
between  two  lines  of  frowning  fortifications 
(behind  which  hide  two  armies  thirsting  for 
each  other's  blood),  should  have  clothed  itself 
with  mystery  and  irresistibly  appealed  to  the 
140 


imagination  of  the  soldiers!  "No  Man's 
Land!"  The  land  of  the  unknown  and  the 
accidental.  The  land  of  contingency,  of 
chance,  of  uncertainty,  where  the  wheel  of 
fortune  hung  calmly  and  silently  upon  her 
axle,  waiting  for  the  hand  of  Destiny  to  give 
it  the  fateful  whirl. 

What  scenes  have  been  witnessed  in  "No 
Man's  Land!"  What  deeds  of  derring-do 
have  been  done  in  that  narrow  lane!  Above 
it  shriek  the  shells  of  the  covering  barrage; 
across  it  sweeps  the  hail  of  shrapnel  and  of 
machine  guns;  over  it  rolls  the  wave  of  as- 
phyxiating gas.  It  is  webbed  with  barbed 
wire  fencing.  It  is  punctured  with  shell  holes. 
In  the  silent  midnight  heroes  creep  upon  it 
bellywise  like  snakes,  stealthily  seeking  in- 
formation, erecting  obstacles,  searching  for 
dead  or  wounded  comrades,  grappling  with 
foes  as  invisible  as  themselves. 

In  the  daytime — heaven  help  them — by  the 
thousands  and  hundreds  of  thousands  living 
men  (as  sensitive  to  the  joys  of  life,  to  light, 
to  love,  to  beauty,  to  happiness,  as  you  or  I) 
leap  into  it  over  the  tops  of  trenches  to  shoot, 
to  bayonet,  to  club  each  other  to  the  death, 
tearing  and  rending  one  another  like  the 
creatures  of  a  primeval  world. 

"No  Man's  Land!"  Deeds  have  been  done 
there  at  which  the  sun  and  the  moon  and  the 
141 


stars  must  have  shuddered,  at  which  midnight 
must  have  paled  and  angels  wept.  And  there, 
also,  deeds  have  been  done  at  whose  sublimity 
the  eyes  of  generations  yet  unborn  will  shed 
their  tears  of  wonder  and  of  admination. 

"No  Man's  Land!"  In  every  struggle  of 
ideas  and  of  ideals,  of  opinions  and  of  judg- 
ments, there  is  such  an  unoccupied  and  dis- 
puted territory.  Between  denominations,  be- 
tween sects,  between  parties,  between  theories, 
between  nations,  between  races,  it  stretches 
itself  an  object  of  passionate  desire  and 
struggle.  There  was  "No  Man's  Land"  be- 
tween Christianity  and  paganism,  between 
feudalism  and  nationalism,  between  aboli- 
tionism and  slaveholding.  There  is  to-day  a 
"No  Man's  Land"  between  prohibition  and 
the  liquor  interests,  between  autocracy  and 
democracy,  between  Socialism  and  individ- 
ualism, between  labor  and  capital. 

Gradually,  inevitably,  intermittently  the 
struggle  for  possession  of  the  disputed  territory 
goes  on  and  on  and  on. 

And  the  right  is  slowly  gaining  ground! 


U2 


"Gone  West." 

WAS  it  dread  of  that  harsh  word  "death," 
or  the  ineradicable  sense  of  humor,  or 
that  supernal  consciousness  of  beauty  in  the 
soul  of  youth  which  gave  birth  to  that  ex- 
quisite metaphor  of  the  trenches, "Gone  West"? 

Death  as  the  setting  of  a  sun,  a  moon,  or 
star!  Nothing  was  ever  finer,  nothing  ever 
lovelier,  nothing  ever  more  consoling,  for  they 
set,  to  rise  again.  And  so  do  the  souls  of 
heroes.  "I  believe  with  all  my  soul;  I  know," 
exclaimed  Tolstoi  at  80,  "that  dying  I  shall 
be  happy — I  shall  enter  a  world  more  real." 
And  Victor  Hugo  once  broke  forth  in  a  sort 
of  rapture:  "I  am  the  tadpole  of  an  arch- 
angel!" Perhaps  it  was  the  same  conscious- 
ness of  an  indestructible  something  within 
these  perishable  bodies  of  ours  which  made 
these  glorious  youths  of  the  Flanders  front 
create,  or  at  least  give,  such  wide  currency  to 
a  phrase  that  can  never  die. 

Measure,  if  you  can,  the  spiritual  value  of 
that  phrase  in  this  ghastly  era  of  destruction 
and  of  death!  To  how  many  a  soldier  dying 
alone  in  "No  Man's  Land"  it  must  have  given 
hope.  To  what  multitudes  of  those  who  mourn 
the  loss  of  sons  and  brothers,  husbands  and 
lovers,  it  must  have  breathed  a  heavenly  con- 
solation. "He  is  not  dead,  but  sleepeth."  He 
*43 


is  not  dead;  his  star  has  set  to  rise  again. 
"He  has  gone  West!" 

If  that  imperishable  hope  which  animates 
the  heart  of  all  Christendom  is  based  upon 
reality  (and  there  can  no  more  be  a  great  hope 
without  some  actual  foundation  than  there 
can  be  a  shadow  without  a  substance,  or  a 
quality  without  a  substratum  of  being),  it 
would  be  a  memorable  vision  to  see  the 
ethereal  spirits  of  those  young  gladiators  es- 
caping from  their  dead  bodies,  rising  into  the 
air  and  "Going  West!" 

We  have  seen  in  golden  autumns,  while  the 
breezes  shook  the  tree  tops  and  agitated  the 
grasses  in  the  meadows,  myriads  of  feathery, 
buoyant,  gossamer-like  seeds  released  from 
their  imprisoning  sheaths  and  sailing  away 
upon  the  wings  of  the  wind,  to  impregnate 
distant  and  sterile  fields  with  their  super- 
abundant life. 

God  has  determined  for  some  wise  reason  of 
His  own  to  conceal  from  our  eyes  a  phenom- 
enon infinitely  more  imposing,  the  flight  of 
those  beautiful  souls  which  He  transplants  to 
the  gardens  of  Paradise,  but  being  invisible  is 
no  evidence  of  being  unreal.  Always  and 
everywhere  it  is  the  unseen,  the  inaudible  and 
the  intangible  which  is  the  actual  and  which 
alone  survives. 

"He  is  not  dead,  but  sleepeth!"  The  seed 
144 


dies  into  a  new  life,  and  so  does  man.  The 
caterpillar  withdraws  into  the  chrysalis  to 
emerge  a  butterfly.  The  stars  set  to  rise 
again.  It  is  this  sublime  faith,  or  gleaming  of 
hope,  or  inextinguishable  desire  in  the  hearts 
of  these  youthful  warriors  which  has  trans- 
lated that  grim  word  death  into  that  brilliant 
and  triumphant  phrase,  "Gone  West,"  and 
given  inspiration  and  courage  to  him  who 
wrote  that  greatest  poem  of  the  war,  "I  Have 
a  Rendezvous  With  Death:" 

I  have  a  rendezvous  with  Death 

At  some  disputed  barricade, 

When  spring  comes  back  with  nestling  shade 

And  apple  blossoms  fill  the  air — 

I  have  a  rendezvous  with  Death 

When  spring  brings  back  blue  days  and  fair. 

It  may  be  he  shall  take  my  hand 

And  lead  me  into  his  dark  land, 

And  close  my  eyes  and  quench  my  breath — 

It  may  be  I  shall  pass  him  still. 

I  have  a  rendezvous  with  Death 
On  some  scarred  slope  of  battered  hill, 
When  spring  comes  round  again  this  year 
And  the  first  meadow  flowers  appear. 

God  knows  'twere  better  to  be  deep 
Pillowed  in  silk  and  scented  down, 
Where  love  throbs  out  in  blissful  sleep, 
Pulse  right  to  pulse  and  breath  to  breath, 
Where  hushed  awakenings  are  dear, 

H5 


But  I've  a  rendezvous  with  Death 
At  midnight,  in  some  flaming  town, 
When  spring  trips  north  again  this  year. 
And  I  to  my  pledged  word  am  true, 
I  shall  not  fail  my  rendezvous. 


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inn 


Princeton   Theological  Semmary-Speer  Library 


1    1012  01005  4734 


